Once More, With Feeling
by JinnySkeans
Summary: Art enables us to find ourselves and lose ourselves at the same time.
1. Plie

It's late.

It's always late when I leave practice. I don't remember what it's like to take a quick lunch, or a break, or anything resembling a break during practice hours. And practice hours are every day. Sometimes I forget what it's like to feel the sun on my face. And I realize maybe that might sound dramatic, since no one's forcing me to do this. No one's forcing me to embrace the beauty and the horror of my craft with this absurd, narrow-minded focus on being the best and beating the best. No one but myself.

And maybe that's the worst kind of slave contract in the world: the one you sign yourself.

Anyway.

The other dancers have all gone home already. So has our instructor, Miss Suzume. So it's just me in the studio, facing the enormous wall-to-ceiling, unforgiving, painfully honest mirrors and the sprawling expanse of polished hardwood. Me and my sweat and my blood and tears that don't come as quick as they used to, and a little old CD player playing my newest song on repeat.

There's no clock in our dance studio. Miss Suzume tells us it's so we're focused on what we're doing, instead of what time it is. I'm not in any hurry to leave, though. Just in a really big hurry to _improve._

_I still have so much to do,_ I think, pausing for a moment. My muscles ache, but that just means I'm getting better. Stronger. Faster, more flexible, more poised. And with so much to do, I can't afford to leave just yet. Even if I can't remember the last time I ate, even if I forget what it's like to take a moment and just _relax,_ even if I'm running on something too diluted to be adrenaline but too indistinguishable to be anything else, I still have work I need to do.

I'm late on my brise' at an integral moment in the piece. I land sloppily, since I'm trying to catch up to the music (and doesn't that just fit my whole life completely? Falling behind, desperately trying to catch up?) So I do what always works for me: I repeat the same move twenty times, until I won't, _can't_ screw it up again.

I make the jump for the nth time, and I move swiftly enough to satisfy myself. The CD player's been playing the same two bars on loop for close to an hour now as I try and execute a masterful performance for the girl spinning and leaping and twirling in the mirror, who is my harshest critic.

When will it be enough for you, girl in the mirror?

"_Execution is everything!"_ I hear Miss Suzume's reedy voice echo throughout the empty studio. "_Technique is key, you worthless waste! If you can't keep your toes pointed and your knees straight and your back arched, you might as well get out of this studio and never show your face here again!"_

No room for creative interpretation. No room for passion or going with the flow or everything dance used to be to me, as a little girl in a rough neighborhood, dreaming of glamour and renown. Just polishing, refining, honing the basics. Blending into the background. An automaton, programmed to execute move after move on command with startling precision.

And it's what I'm best at. The technical aspect of dance. It's what has won me so many awards, so many trophies and crowns and ribbons and sashes and plaques and certificates and banners from all over the world.

But it's what's destroying me, little by little, every day. This slavish connection I have with music and with ballet, this iron grip of inescapable bondage, this seesaw of love and loathing in the only aspect of my life I ever had any control over, until recently.

I'm Sakura Haruno. I'm seventeen, a student at Konoha Performing Arts Academy, and the principal dancer in the KPAA Student Ballet.

And that's all there is to me, I think.

All you need to know, anyway.

* * *

Ino tells me I'm a robot.

I tell her she's a sellout.

She's my best friend.

After I leave the studio, I meet her for a quick workout in the student gym. She knows I've been practicing in the studio for the past six hours, knows the healthiest thing I can do right now is get some food in me and go to sleep so I can start this whole miserable cycle over again in the morning, but she doesn't question me anymore. Not seriously, anyway. She knows I won't listen.

"I kept screwing up my blise'," I tell her, venting my frustration on her and on the elliptical I'm traversing, summoning nonexistent energy to the muscles burning like fire in my thighs. "Stupid fucking mistake after stupid fucking mistake. There's no way they'll accept me at KCA next year, not if I keep fucking up the fundamentals like this!"

"Relax, Forehead," Ino drawls, her long blonde ponytail whipping back and forth as she charges her machine to go slightly faster than mine; despite my exhaustion, I will not be outdone, and I up the speed on mine as well. "Miss Suzume's in your head, you know. You're the best dancer in the school and everyone knows it."

"Not the way I've been performing lately." I raise one hand from the handlebars to brush stubborn pink bangs out of my eyes, and I glance over at the clock on the gym wall that tells me it's 10 o'clock, six hours after dance rehearsal and 18 hours since I ate anything. "And I put on two pounds since last week. Miss Suzume's gonna kill me."

"Not before you kill yourself," Ino scolds me harshly. "Why don't you join me in the hip-hop class, huh? That way you can embrace that gorgeous figure of yours, rather than try and hide it."

She points to my chest, which is heavily bound with tape; ballerinas typically develop late, thanks to such a constantly strenuous workout regimen, but at seventeen, I'm horrified, _horrified_ to finally…blossom, so to speak. Miss Suzume recommends (orders) chest-oriented exercises to try and flatten my breasts, shrink them, harden them, whatever she can do to get rid of them, but they're here to stay.

And really. What seventeen-year-old girl is _horrified_ to finally have a set of 34C's that anyone else would be proud of?

This is my life. These are the sacrifices I make. Little and insignificant at first, but slowly blowing up into something I can't predict or control, until every single facet of my life becomes something to fear, something to _correct._ Right down to my physical _development._

"I'll leave the booty-popping to you," I sigh. "I think Miss Suzume hates me for even _talking_ to you, after you quit ballet last year."

Ino and I were ballerinas together throughout our whole lives. Bitter rivals, better friends, pushing each other faster and harder until one day, in practice last year, Ino just _snapped._ Told Miss Suzume where to shove her baton and stalked out of the ballet studio never to return. That same day, she joined the hiphop dance team under Miss Kurenai, and hasn't looked back.

I wonder if she's happy. It's hard to say, since Ino's the kind of girl who smiles and laughs and titters and giggles and swoons even when she's sad. But I think of the look on her face that day she quit, the way her blue eyes were full of this crazy kind of fire, this _life_ I hadn't seen in her throughout every arabesque, every plie, every jete. Like she was taking command of her life, taking control of it, taking it back, even if she was throwing away sixteen years of carefully cultivated work and effort.

I think about how I might feel in that situation, but I tamp it down almost immediately. I love ballet, remember? I love ballet, don't I? I could never turn my back on it now. Not when I'm so close to graduating, so close to becoming _someone._

"I don't see how KPAA still lets her teach here," Ino says severely, slowing her elliptical program to a walk. "She's abusive, she's ruthless, she's downright _cruel…_"

"She just wants us to be the best dancers we can be," I say dully, but the words have a dreary, rehearsed quality to them, even to my own ears. Ino and I have had this discussion before, countless times. Her opinion is the opinion of most of the school, but I can't afford to agree with her.

"There's a difference between wanting you to be a good dancer and wanting you to starve yourself to death. Don't think I haven't noticed, Sakura. When's the last time you ate anything?"

"This morning. Don't worry, I just haven't had time." And it's true. I'm not anorexic. I eat when I can.

I just never seem to be able to, that's all.

I slow my machine down and hop off, fanning myself with my hand. It's never a good idea to drink water immediately after a harsh workout, but I do it anyway. Kind of a punishment for not going as hard as I meant to today. I'll deserve the stomachache in a few minutes, and maybe it'll stave off the hunger until tomorrow.

"You'll make yourself sick!" Ino scolds, but I roll my eyes. I'm done listening to her about this, so I change the subject.

"We have Music Theory first thing tomorrow…did you go over the notes? Mr. Orochimaru practically announced a pop quiz to us, and his are always ruthless."

"Shit," Ino cusses, smacking her forehead. Crisis averted; I know she hasn't looked at the notes yet. Not now that she has a boyfriend (Sai, a really odd but very cute painter in the advanced class), she doesn't seem to have time for much else. Without me and Hinata to nag her every day, she'd never get any schoolwork done. "Fuck me, I totally forgot. I was over at Sai's, and…"

"I know, I know, I know," I drawl. "Come on, let's get changed and head back to our rooms. I need a fucking shower and some sleep."

"And some food," Ino adds severely. She snatches her gym bag from the locker room, plunges her hand inside, and withdraws a juicy red apple. Red Delicious. The sweetest kind. My mouth waters, and she presses it into my hands. Looks at me expectantly.

Sometimes I'm strong enough to avoid the temptation. Sometimes I'm able to put the apple away, throw it out, pretend to eat it but forget about it completely, because even healthy fruit has calories and calories make you fat and the fat dancers don't jump as high, Sakura.

Sometimes.

Tonight, though, I succumb to the allure, and I take a bite. It's as good as its exterior promised to be, sweet and crunchy, no holes, no bruises, nothing but deliciousness.

And it tastes like failure, too, but I don't tell Ino that.

* * *

"You need a boyfriend, Sakura," Ino tells me that night, after we're both showered and dressed for bed. I sit on her bed with our Music Theory text opened between us as we review the last chapter.

"Like I have time for that," I scoff immediately. I don't even entertain the thought. I'm a dance student. A ballerina. A competitive dancer and my entire _life_ is dedicated to my craft. I barely have time to spend with any of my friends outside of the gym or the classroom. How could I possibly pencil in a _boy?_

"You should make time. You're missing out on so much, you know. You're seventeen, and you…"

"Ino, enough," I say, sharp as I always am with her, as we always are with each other. I clip my damp bangs back out of my face, and return to my reading. "I just…I really need this scholarship. To KCA. Okay? It has to be my number one priority."

"You're gonna get it, Forehead. You're the best dancer in the school, you have the highest grades, you live, breathe, and eat ballet like it's already your career…but Jesus, do you even _like_ it anymore?"

"Of course I do!" I insist.

Right? I like it. I love it. It's my thing. My only thing, the only thing I can do. So I have to like it. Right?

"I just don't get it, man. I really don't. I feel like…like you're gonna wake up two years from now locked into this situation you can't get out of, and…"

"Ino you're being fucking ridiculous, you know that, right?" I interject.

I KNOW you don't get it, Ino. I'm _already_ locked into this situation I can't get out of. I haven't even gotten into Konoha College of the Arts yet, but already, my entire future is laid out before me. And it's my dream, sort of, so I have no right to feel this way. So…discontent. Unfulfilled. Like something's missing.

And because I have no right, I'm not gonna fucking talk about it. I'm not gonna fucking acknowledge it in any way. I'm gonna double and redouble my efforts, really polish this piece I'm working on for the end-of-year student concert. Because if I can pull that off, I'll nail that scholarship to KCA for sure. And then maybe I'll be able to breathe.

But until then, this has to be my life.

An early morning run. Class until three. Dance until ten. Another workout, homework, and sleep. Seeing my friends when I can, but only if it's brief, because there are other girls, remember, Sakura? Ones who don't bother with their friends, ones who give 110% while you only give 100. And they're gonna get it before you because you don't _want it enough,_ remember?

Remember, Sakura?

Well, fuck that.

This is my life for right now. I'm Sakura. I'm 17, I'm a ballet student, and I don't know if I'm doing what I love anymore.

And that's all there is to me, I think.

And if things keep up this way, that's all there ever will be.

Maybe I am a robot. And maybe it doesn't matter anymore.

* * *

**note..** hello, my beauties! before you break out the pitchforks and scream at me for making another story instead of finishing my old ones, keep this in mind: i have to have a lot going on at once to keep myself interested. if i HAVE to write a particular story, i lose inspiration and interest and motivation and forget about it completely. having a diverse amount of stories to work with keeps me involved in my own writing. so i won't apologize, because i promised i'd finish all my stories eventually and i mean it.

and!

this story is partially based on my experiences with dance, which means it's a) gonna be a bit darker than things i normally write and b) not the standard to which you should hold all dancers or dance-oriented stories. everyone has a different experience, and for as difficult and consuming as it was for me at times, it's also one of my biggest passions in life, and a beautiful, gorgeous, brilliant art form that i love being a part of. kind of a sell-your-soul kind of deal. ballet especially. but every style of dance is extremely difficult to master, and i have a HUGE respect for dancers of any skill level. it's also about art and expression in other mediums, and how true art is left to interpretation.

it's gonna be written in first person, alternating between sakura and sasuke each chapter, as you'll see coming up. i hope you stick around and that you enjoy this new jinnyskeans jawn. and keep a weather eye on the horizon for other updates from me (i won't leave my other jawns hanging just because i have this shiny new toy i want to play with right away.) pinky swear.

that was a long note. i am a blowhard. BOO.

what'd you think?

hope you had a marvelous new years!

xoxo daisy


	2. Shading

After awhile, you get used to the needles.

The noise the gun makes, anyway. And what I'm doing right now is stupid. Foolish. Arrogant beyond all belief, according to my brother, but if I listened to him, who knows where I would be?

Because I'm finishing a tattoo on my right arm. With my left hand.

Free-hand.

Itachi would kill me if he knew.

But he's out touring with his band right now. Akatsuki's doing really well, and how could they not, with my blessed, all-talented older brother headlining for them? (I'm not bitter, I swear.)

Just a little disillusioned, I guess.

There's always pain with tattoos. Anyone who says it doesn't hurt them is lying. Of course it fucking hurts, but that's not the point. The point is sticking it out till the end, through a process that takes hours and hours, a high threshold for pain, and all the fucking guts in the world. Because if you fuck it up, there's no way of hiding it, not when you wear the brand.

Doing it to yourself is even worse. You can't move. You can't adjust yourself. And it hurts like hell, but you're doing it to yourself, so you only have yourself to blame in the first place. Sort of this controlled kind of masochism, all for the sake of art.

And what I do? That ain't art.

I dip the needle in the ink again, turn the gun on. The outline of lightning bolts on my right arm is black and harsh and severe, the way I like my tattoos. Nothing frilly, nothing feminine, just fucking lightning. The harsh grinding vanishes into the background as I concentrate, filling in the outline all the way to my wrist.

I glance at my reflection in the mirror, examine the outline from a different angle, and I'm arrogantly pleased with my work. As an apprentice, I'm not technically allowed to work on anyone without my mentor present, but Kakashi's pretty lenient when I want to draw all over myself. This, though, he might be pissed about; I'm using a lot of ink.

I'm Sasuke Uchiha. I go to Konoha Performing Arts Academy, studying guitar and musicianship, and I moonlight as a tattoo artist.

Go figure.

* * *

"That looks painful as shit," Naruto remarks on the way back to our dorms. He's pointing to my newly finished outline; the skin is inflamed and aggravated, bleeding a bit in some places where I drove the needle too hard, but all of it is practice, to help me get better. And it's painful, but I can deal with pain.

"Hn. Pussy," I tell him to start a needless argument.

Predictably, he rises to the bait.

"Who you callin a pussy, asshole? I let you tattoo my fucking _stomach,_ didn't I?"

Naruto was my first client, so to speak. As in, we snuck into Kakashi's tattoo shop after hours last year when he wasn't there, and I tattooed a sick ass spiral on his stomach for practice. It looks badass as shit, though looking back on it, maybe I should've fucked it up on purpose. Just to give him something _real_ to complain about.

Naruto's my best friend.

KPAA is positioned on a sprawling green campus, overgrown with trees and flowers. World famous for the talent it produces, notorious for the rigorous training schedules it assigns. The kids here live and breathe art and music and shit; for a guitarist, there's nowhere better to be.

At least, that's what they tell me.

It's late now, and I just closed the shop with Kakashi, and Naruto and I meet on campus to head back to our dorm rooms together. Nights in Konoha are warm without being stiflingly hot, and there's a decent breeze blowing. It feels good on my new ink. Cools off the overheated skin.

"There goes Sakura," Naruto says suddenly, this slavish, adoring tone to his voice. I roll my eyes but glance over to where he's pointing anyway.

The girl he's pointing to, Sakura, is a girl everyone on campus knows or at least has heard of. She's supposed to be the best ballet dancer in the school, and her work ethic is famous, second only to this witchy spell she has over most of the guys at Konoha. I can't tell you how many times I've been in the locker room at the gym, or in the studio recording a new track, or just walking around the quad and her name pops up. Always with this kind of reverence, like she eclipses the whole of her gender, or a dirty, sexual lasciviousness, with the speaker going into great detail as to where he'd like to bend her over.

She doesn't have that power over me. She's a looker, I'll give her that, but I've never so much as spoken to her, nor has she ever given any sign she wanted to speak to me. Probably thinks herself too good to talk to the troubled younger brother of Itachi Uchiha, international recording star.

I glare at her, and resent her for this perceived indignity.

"Come on, man, even _you_ have to admit she's the hottest thing in the entire _universe!_" Naruto elbows me in the side, narrowly missing my freshly-tattooed arm, and narrowly escaping a very painful, violent death at my hands. "She's so mysterious, too! She's always in the studio practicing. No one ever sees her at parties or anything."

I don't care. I don't care about Naruto's bizarre devotion to a girl he's never actually met in person, or the legend surrounding a girl I don't pretend to be curious about. I have my own shit to worry about, and with that, I walk faster towards our dormitory, to discourage any further hero worship.

He gets the hint and keeps pace with me up the walkway to the musicians' dorm. I stay on the second floor, Naruto on the third, and we part ways on the staircase. I have work to do on this new song that'll take me most of the night, and my arm's sore as shit. Maybe I should've waited till the weekend to experiment on myself.

Whatever. I look my newest tattoo over in the mirror hanging on my door, and I find very few things to dislike. A winding array of lightning bolts streaking from the shoulder all the way to my wrist, a perfect complement to the sleeve on my other arm of licks of flame. Not my only tattoos, but certainly my most prominent ones.

But that's only half of my so-called passion. The other half is what got me into KPAA in the first place. What will make me famous, if my teachers are to be believed.

I'm a guitarist, see. Self-taught until I got into KPAA, and now I take classes.

I prefer playing electric, with an amp, but everything's locked away in the studio across campus. They don't want any asshole coming in from work at eleven at night playing hard rock chords with the bass turned up so the walls shake, since everyone's studying all the time. So late at night in my room, I'm restricted to acoustic, but that gives me time to lay down some new rhythms and polish up my playing.

I sit on my bed and my fingers find the frets on their own, without me needing to think about it. It's second nature now. I could play in my sleep. Ignoring the painful twinge in my arm (which is bound to hurt worse tomorrow) I strum a few chords, tune it up a little, and lay back down on my pillows, the bulky old six-string on my stomach as I play a few chord arrangements I thought up earlier, at the shop.

I'm almost out of this dump.

The phone rings, and I know there's only one person to call me this late. I sigh and answer.

"Hn."

"Little brother, so pleasant to hear your dulcet tones!"

Itachi's drunk, I can hear it in his voice. He's drunk almost all the time lately, always calls from some club or bar or concert hall, some random chick's house, wherever. Out on the road, he's got nothing but time to waste between performances, and handlers who get him hammered from morning till dusk. I wonder if he's spiraling out, but he's an adult, ain't he?

"What do you want. It's late."

"Is it a crime to want to speak to my beloved younger brother of whom I think so highly?"

"At midnight it is. I have class in the morning."

"I think you'll agree with me that you have _no _class." Then he laughs at himself, and against my will, I smirk a bit, too. Because I go to this rigorous, elite, prestigious performing arts school a la Juilliard, but I'm draped in tattoos and a bad attitude. No class is right.

"Where are you now?" I ask, just for something to do. Because even if I resent my brother for his success, and even if I'm bitter and heated and everything that I just can't seem to stack up, he's my brother, and I love him.

"Uh…Kusa, last I checked."

"You have no idea, do you."

"Nope. Does it matter?"

And he means the question innocuously, but it hits me really close to home and shit. Does it matter?

Does it matter?

Does _anything_ matter? Music, tattooing, art for the sake of art, competition, being the best, beating the best, trying, working, sweating, bleeding…at this fucking academy, what is any of this _for?_ What's the pay-off? Is it Itachi? An international recording star in the eyes of the public, a degenerating alcoholic in the eyes of those who know him best?

Is that what's waiting for me out there?

"I'm going to bed," I mumble into the receiver.

"Good night, little brother. Sweet dreams." More giggling; he's really fucking hammered.

And I hang up on him, on this heroic big brother of mine, who's disillusioned to the point of drunkenness every single night, who doesn't know where he's at or even cares anymore, who's sold his soul to his art without being really cognizant of the price he'd have to pay:

Self-control is the first thing to go when you're out on the road.

And I lay back down and try to sleep, but there's a burning pain in my arm that tells me I need Aquaphor and a decent meal, and maybe to take caution from my brother's example, and ease up every once in awhile.

There's no need to go balls out on every single aspect of your life, but with a full self-drawn fresh sleeve on my arm that stings like a motherfucker, I'm the last person to preach about temperance.

* * *

Naruto's annoying. Ever since he brought her up the other night, I've been seeing more and more of that Sakura girl without meaning to. You know how you never really notice if something's there or not, until somebody brings it up, and then you start seeing it everywhere?

It's not that I go out of my way to look for her, either. But she kind of sticks out everywhere she goes. Which, as it turns out, ain't so many places: the rumors about her are true, and if she ain't in class, she's holed up in that dance studio across campus.

I stay in the musicians' dorms, and I practice in the music room. I have no reason to stray onto the dance quad, and I'd never even bother cutting through there in the first place, but the tattoo shop I work at is close by. So because Naruto pointed her out to me, and because I've always had an eye for freaky shit that looks totally out of place, I start seeing her more often.

And it's so fucking cliché, how we officially meet.

I'm on my way back to my room from the tattoo shop; Kakashi normally doesn't care if I experiment on myself as long as I ain't working on clients without his supervision, but he saw my sleeve and really chewed my ass out.

"How long did that take you?" he'd asked me.

"Hn. Six hours."

"And let me guess: you did it in one session."

"Aa."

So I had to sit tight and listen to a lecture on taking my time with shit, and not rushing, and whatever. But in the end, he told me my line work was solid and my shading was on point.

So with that in mind, I'm in a decent mood as I head back to my room.

I cut through the dance quad, since it's faster, but I'm not really in any hurry to get back. I'm not tired yet, and I have some new ideas for new tattoo designs that I'm working out in my head as I walk. And it's a warm night with a decent wind, so my footsteps drag.

The buildings here are older than the ones on the music quad, where I stay. Konoha renovated the music rooms a couple of years ago, installed new equipment, updated the acoustics, added a whole bunch of shit to keep us as modern with the times as possible. But the dance quad looks largely untouched, big stone buildings from years and years and years before I was born, wearing down but standing strong, imposing, permanent.

And completely by accident, I happen to be looking over at Dance Studio A, when the door is thrown open and that Sakura girl comes floating out.

I don't mean to notice things about her, but I'm an artist (an amateur, pathetic, shallow imitation of one anyway) and I look at everything with an artist's eye, so there's things about her I can't help but pick out. There's her pink hair, of course, which I'm stunned she's allowed to keep in a field like ballet, where uniformity is key or whatever, but more than that, it's the way she moves.

She's not dancing right now, of course, but she carries herself like she doesn't know any other way. There's this weird kind of grace that you don't see in the average girl, like she's…like she's floating, rather than walking. Her posture is perfectly straight, and she moves quickly, her footfalls in the tiny slippers she's wearing light as air on the grass. Her ponytail flips back and forth like a pendulum, and she's reading something with a backpack slung over her shoulder. She doesn't notice me.

But I notice the guy following her.

It's not my business. Maybe it's one of her friends. Sakura's pretty popular around here, even if she never has any spare time to spend with the people who worship her so much. Maybe it's a boyfriend. Maybe he knows her. It's not my business. None of my concern.

And I can't explain it, I really can't, but something doesn't feel right. And so even though it's completely out of my way, I follow both of them. Sakura, who's absorbed in her reading and not paying any fucking attention, and the tall guy hurrying behind her.

_It's almost eleven,_ I think to myself, irritated with a girl I've never even spoken to, for her naivete. _What kind of girl is she, to walk around this late by herself?_

I'm getting closer to the guy, and he's getting closer to her. And I realize grimly that I was right to follow them, because the closer I get, the more I realize this asshole's intention, and it ain't friendly. He looks side to side and sees that there's nobody else around, before he calls out, "Oi, Sakura!"

She whirls around, surprised, sees who it is, and her eyes narrow.

"I told you to leave me _alone,_ Zaku," she snaps. And this is odd, for me, anyway. Because for as many times as I've seen Sakura Haruno, in passing or by accident or whenever Naruto points her out with that slavish affection, I've never seen any expression on her face but serenity. Friendliness. Always smiling, even if it's fake.

Now, though, I see what she looks like pissed. Confrontational.

And it's more of an honest emotion, more honest than the saccharine sweetness she effects for all of her admirers. Begrudgingly, I admit to myself that the look is attractive, before I remember why I'm here. They don't seem to have noticed me yet, since it's dark and there's shadows and this kid, Zaku, is an idiot, which suits me fine.

"No need to be such a tight ass," he snaps back. "Jesus, what's _with_ you ballet girls?"

"I can't speak for the others," she hisses, like a viper, "but _I've_ got standards. Stop calling me. Stop texting me. Stop showing up at my rehearsals. Stop asking my friends about me. I'm not. Fucking. Interested."

And she spins around again.

Big mistake. I can tell by the way Zaku coils like a spring; you never turn your back on an enemy. And maybe this girl's been sniffing rosin for too long, holed up in that ivory tower of a ballet studio, thinking she's untouchable, because the second her back's turned, the kid makes his move. Reaches out, his hand on her shoulder, goes to pull her back around, but I speak up.

"Hey."

They both jump, and they finally see me. Sakura looks confused; she's never spoken to me in her life, so why would I be interfering in something like this? And Zaku, to my eternal gratification, looks horrified.

"U-Uchiha?"

I'm fucking famous around this school, even if I don't want to be, and sometimes, like now, just my _name_ is enough of a threat to weaklings like this shithead, to the point where I don't even need to show him why I've never lost a fistfight in seventeen years.

"This don't concern you, man," he barks out, looking intimidated, but still trying to act like tough shit. His hand, I notice, slides off Sakura's shoulder, though.

"You heard her," I say quietly, and I keep my face neutral, but I concentrate enough Uchiha venom into my voice to give this kid a heart attack. "Clear out."

Sakura's eyes are wide, and I've never been this close to her before, to see that they're this bright, dizzying green. Unconsciously, I think about how I could mix that precise color with ink, and then I note her pale, luminiscent skin, and think to myself how well light skin like that would pick up ink. Nice pale skin that would show off bright color really well.

Zaku opens his mouth to argue, then clearly thinks better of it. He shoots a filthy glare at Sakura before muttering, "Whatever, bitch," and stalking off.

I debate if I want to follow him, if I want to smack him around for using that word to describe a girl, even one as notoriously uptight as Sakura Haruno, but I don't think it's worth it. Instead, my gaze shoots to her instead.

Realizing what a close call this must have been for her, I'm expecting tears, maybe shudders. But I'm surprised, because she looks perfectly composed. Like this is nothing new for her, like she's used to this kind of treatment, which I recognize as sexual harassment, but she might see as something else entirely: status quo.

It pisses me off.

"You all right?" I ask, just to see if she'll crack. She should; I read the intent in Zaku as clear as anyone. If I hadn't been there, who knows what would've happened?

"I'm fine, thank you," she replies, her voice lower and raspier than I've been expecting from someone with cotton candy hair and ballet slippers. She adjusts the strap of her backpack, which slipped when Zaku grabbed her. "You didn't have to do that. Usually he just gives up."

"'Usually?'" I repeat, even angrier. "So this has happened before."

"It's nothing," she shrugs it off. "But thank you, seriously. I'm Sakura, by the way. You're Sasuke Uchiha, right?"

So she _has_ heard of me, then.

"Aa."

"Nice to meet you, Sasuke," she says, and there's a smile on her face that looks as honest as the snarl she'd worn two seconds ago. She sticks out her hand like we're strangers meeting at a party, instead of on the street in the middle of the night.

I'm a bit taken aback, honestly. Sakura's regarded as so untouchable here that I never thought she might actually be just down-to-earth. In my head, I always pictured her as an aloof little snob the way most of the dancers here at KPAA are. I might need to reevaluate.

But I take her hand anyway. It's colder than I thought it would be.

"Oh, I'm sorry, I'm holding you up... Sorry, I'm fucking exhausted…it's nice meeting you, Sasuke. Thanks for your help. I'm sure I'll see you around sometime."

With a final smile, she bounces away from me with a spring in her step, returning to her reading.

"Pay attention next time," I scold her, but I don't think she hears me.

Tch. Stupid girl.

* * *

By coincidence, later in the week, Zaku shows up in Kakashi's shop for a shin tattoo. Wants the words "No Regrets". One of the other apprentices, Kiba, is a friend of mine, and when I briefly explain the situation, he smirks in understanding and takes Zaku for his client.

And it's a total fucking accident, I swear it, when Zaku leaves the shop pissed as shit, his jacked-up tattoo reading, "No Egrets" and all of us laughing behind him.

And it's all in the name of art. I swear.

I just hope one day, this all pays off. Whatever's waiting out there for me outside KPAA, I hope it's worth all this uncertainty.

* * *

**note..** I'm trying something new with incorporating Itachi into this story. I like the idea of having him as this scary kind of foil to Sasuke; how they're really close and they love each other, but Sasuke recognizes how Itachi's spiraling out of control and that he represents the darker side to fame and art and music. I'll elaborate more on that later on.

And I realize Zaku's a fairly generic villain in my stories, but as I don't like using original characters and he's just really remorselessly evil, it works out well for me.

I'm taking this story in a different direction than my other ones, so I hope you stick around to read more. Thank you very much for reading and reviewing :)

xoxo daisy :)


	3. Jete

2nd place.

2nd place is 1st loser.

It's not what I'm trained for. It's not what I practice so hard for. It's not what I aspire to.

But 2nd place is what I take home from the first competition of the season. 2nd place, and Miss Suzume's horrible sneer, and a boatload of brand new insecurities to lose sleep over at night.

I missed 1st place by .25 points. It's worse than coming in last, as far as I'm concerned, the knowledge that I had it right up until the end, but a tiny mistake cost me somewhere along the line. I even know exactly where it all went to shit: I missed a turn. I went for five turns, managed four. To the untrained eye, I didn't make a single mistake.

The bus ride back to campus is quiet. Miss Suzume fumes in the front seat beside the driver. The other girls congratulate me, since I placed higher than all of them, and I smile at their congratulations but goddamn does the gesture feel forced and empty. Like this whole ballet _thing._

I would have been so proud of my 2nd place trophy three years ago. Back when ballet was what I loved, rather than…the only thing I can do, I guess, so I've got to do it well.

Now, though, I can't wait to get back to my dorm room so I can shove this physical reminder of my failure right the fuck under my bed where it belongs. Never to be seen again.

* * *

There are certain things that you have to tolerate, being a dancer.

The agonizing practices, the long hours, the frequent workouts, the constant dieting, the feeling of never, ever, ever being good enough and the destructive cycle of perfection and punishment, that goes without saying.

But there's also another aspect to it that you might not actually expect.

The feeling that I am always, always, always running out of _money._

Dance is expensive. From the get-go, it's expensive. There's lessons when you're young, costumes, entrance fees into competitions and it only adds up over time. I was lucky to get a scholarship into KPAA back in middle school (a little girl from a ghetto foster home can't hope for much else than a miracle), but the scholarship doesn't cover _everything. _It's competition season, and the fees are steeper than ever, and I need as many first-place victories as I can possibly grab to polish my application to Konoha College of the Arts.

Bottom line? I need a job.

The problem is, I have almost _no_ availability, except on the weekends. After my recitals. It complicates things one afternoon as I sit in my dorm room, my study notes on one side of my desk and the want ads on the other.

_Who would hire me?_ I think, half in amusement, half in despair. _A stressed-out, no-time-having ballerina?_

I've never had a job before. Seventeen and I've never had a job. Well I guess you could count dance as a job, but it feels more like indentured servitude. I'm not collecting a paycheck for all the hours I spend in the studio, staring at myself in the wall-length mirror criticizing everything about me.

If self-critique was a job, I'd be CEO.

_Maybe I could find a third-shift job somewhere,_ I think with a sigh, picking up the want ads without really wanting to. _I could work overnight, sleep a couple of hours…it wouldn't really have to affect my dance schedule as long as I could pencil in some time for homework…_

My eyes are drawn to a position opening for "overnight cleaner" at a tattoo parlor two blocks from my dance studio.

Funny, how I spend every minute of my life living, breathing, inhaling, expelling dance, and I might not even be qualified to vacuum floors in the middle of the night.

* * *

I don't tell Miss Suzume or any of the other dancers about my interview at Kakashi's Ink and Iron.

It's not that I'm ashamed of the fact that I have no money. If anything, I'm proud of myself for how hard I've worked and how far I've come; most of the other girls come from rich, privileged, loving, doting families who have time and resources to spend to cultivating their daughters' talent.

Not so much in my case. I just happened to be in the right place at the right time and seen by the right people. I'm lucky. They weren't handing out too many scholarships on the rough side of the tracks.

It's just that I don't want them to know I might be about to undertake another commitment. Dance is pretty much everything here, in the ballet studios of KPAA. It's priority one, all the time, even over schoolwork. None of the other girls have jobs; their parents foot the bill for all of our competitions.

So it's something I keep to myself at rehearsal the next morning. When I have to leave early to meet Kakashi at 5:00 for my interview, I tell Miss Suzume I have a doctor's appointment.

* * *

This probably won't surprise anyone, but I've never been inside a tattoo parlor.

Ballerinas don't have tattoos. It affects your employability. None of the premier studios want a girl who's gone and marked herself up head to toe with something that can't be washed off. I'm already at a disadvantage with my pink hair.

So, obviously, a tattoo place really isn't somewhere someone might find Sakura Haruno, but here I am. Dressed in what I hope is appropriate interview attire (but I'm applying for a third shift cleaning job, so maybe the dress was a bit too much), looking around nervously because I really only know my way around a dance studio, and nowhere else.

It's not what I was expecting, but few things in my life are. Kakashi's Ink and Iron is much bigger than I pictured, with a large front room and plush furniture, along with a few weird sculptures and paintings strewn about. There are several smaller rooms, all of them with curtains instead of doors, some of them with curtains drawn. I hear what sounds like drilling equipment behind the drawn-curtain rooms.

"So you're the Haruno girl," a voice interrupts my thoughts, and I jump and look up. There's a tall guy with silvery hair coming towards me, one of his eyes concealed by an eyepatch, the lower half of his face hidden by a bandanna. He's wearing a faded band T-shirt and jeans, tattoos streaking up and down his arms in no particular order. My first impression of Kakashi Hatake is that he might be a pirate.

Shows how naïve you can be in my industry.

"Yes," I squeak out, then I force myself not to sound like such an unemployable _spazz. _"My name's Sakura Haruno, it's nice to meet you." I stick my hand out, smile. Smile for the judges, Sakura. Find their eyes and make them watch you, make them love you, this is your only shot. "I called about the vacancy in the cleaning position."

Kakashi looks at me and even though I can only see one of his eyes, I can tell he's amused as he shakes my hand.

I know it shouldn't irritate me, but it does.

"KPAA?" he guesses.

"Could you tell?" I wince. Is it _bad_ to attend KPAA? Do rough-looking pirate tattoo shop owners look down on kids in performing arts school?

"Well, you're on the short side for a dancer but you've definitely got the air."

When I look at him blankly, he chuckles.

"What I mean is, loosen up a little, sweetheart. This ain't an audition. C'mon, have a seat, let's talk business. You KPAA dancers don't have time for much else, right?"

At the beginning, I thought he might be making fun of me, but there's something strangely authentic about Kakashi that makes me feel relaxed. I'm so used to performing all the time, to being exposed to severe scrutiny and letting people judge every move I make. Kakashi has me talking for two minutes before I realize I'm letting my guard down.

Weird, right? I spend 60 hours a week with a ton of girls who don't know the first thing about me, but I'm in this shop for five minutes and singing like a bird.

"So," Kakashi says, sitting me down not at a desk, but on one of the plush burgundy sofas in the waiting room. He takes a seat beside me and doesn't consult my application or any papers at all, the way other jobs do, instead he slouches against the armrest, one leg propped up on a coffee table with albums of tattoo designs on it. I loosen my self-conscious, ladylike position just a tad. "You're looking at our third shift cleaning job."

"Yes," I reply. "I really need the money," I admit.

He looks at me, hard, and says, "We don't get many ballerinas sniffing around for cleaning jobs. Usually they don't need 'em, with Mommy and Daddy footing the bill over there."

"Well, Mommy and Daddy are dead," I say stiffly, before I can stop myself.

He blinks, then tells me, "Look, sweetheart, it's not like I'm against hiring you. You look like a smart girl and let's face it, washing windows and vacuuming carpets ain't rocket science. But you know this is a _third_ shift job, right? You'd be here alone, at night. I don't know how comfortable I am hiring an underage girl to work alone overnight."

Oh. It's a rejection. Well, I'm used to that, aren't I. Too short. Not tall enough. Not enough emotions. Not enough drive. Not enough, not enough, _never enough._

Bizarrely, irrationally, inconceivably, I'm _angry._

Second place is first loser.

I need this fucking job.

"Look," I say, and my voice is sharp. Harsh. Unforgiving, like the little lost foster kid's shoving through the porcelain princess exterior, but for once, I don't hold that little gutterbutt brat back down. "I need the _money._ At this point, I'd turn to _stripping_ if that's what it took. I know what I am, okay, I know I don't look like much but I can do this job. I _will_ do this job. I can take care of myself and you won't regret hiring me. But I swear I'm more than what I look like."

I really hope so. I hope there's something inside me that makes me stronger than I look. But those are the words that come out of my mouth, and I stare at Kakashi waiting for his response.

His visible eye crinkles up in amusement.

"When can you start?"

* * *

You know the weirdest thing? I haven't been excited for very much in a very long time. Even, _especially,_ about dance. The competitions I used to love going to are obligations now more than anything. Stressors. Panic-inducers.

But I'm fucking _excited_ to start my job. I hurry to Kakashi's Ink and Iron from the ballet studio the next evening. I don't even bother to change; I figure no one's going to be there to care what I'm wearing, and I show up with my brand new set of keys fifteen minutes early.

11:00 pm to 3:00 am every weekday. Minimum wage.

I am _thrilled._

The shop is closed, but there's still a light on when I slide my key into the lock and open the door. Maybe Kakashi's still here wrapping things up for the day.

To my surprise, though, it isn't Kakashi I see behind the front desk when I walk inside.

"Oh!" I say, taken aback slightly, because I recognize the slouchy, surly boy looking at me in surprise. "Uh, hey, Sasuke."

I didn't know he worked here. Like everyone else at school, I knew he had a lot of tattoos, but I never knew he worked in this shop.

It feels weird to say hey to him like we're best friends. The only time we've ever spoken, he was helping me out with Zaku, and that was over a week ago. (Zaku hasn't bothered me since.) But it feels weirder _not_ to, and he responds with, "Hn. _You're_ the new cleaning girl?"

I don't like how he says it. Like he's looking down at me or something. But that's the way I think pretty much everyone is towards me: acting like they're so much better. Maybe I'm paranoid.

"Yeah," I reply. "Kakashi told me he'd…"

"I know," he cuts me off, irritating me even further. "Here's your training manual." He slides a single piece of paper towards me, looking bored. Not really a manual, but then, how hard can cleaning be, really? "He told me to make sure you lock yourself in here. There's a panic button under the counter if you need it."

"All right, thanks."

Sasuke studies me critically, and I'm momentarily taken aback at how handsome he is. I didn't see him all that well in the dark when we met last week, and besides hearing all my classmates fawn about how hot he is, I never really looked at him before. All sharp lines and angles, deep dark eyes. Tall and jacked and…

"You have something against _sleeping?_" he demands.

Annoyed, I snap back, "I have something against being _broke._ Don't worry about me."

"I wasn't _worried,_" he almost snarls.

We're off to a really good start.

"Then don't ask stupid questions," I hiss. "What I do and when I do it is _my_ business."

"Whatever. Do what you want. Just lock the damn door after I leave."

"Gladly!"

"Ugh. Fucking ballerina janitors, what next." Sasuke throws up his hands in annoyance, then seizes a beat-up leather guitar case and a sketchpad with papers falling out of it. Sparing me one last glare, he stalks right out of the shop, then looks back at me expectantly through the glass doors. Rolling my eyes, I make a big production out of locking the door behind him.

And I give him a nice totally-not-a-ballerina-thing-to-do-but-he-fucking-deserves-it-anyways middle finger as I do it.

Do I _imagine_ his smirk?

* * *

The shop's big and there's plenty to clean, but I kind of like the emptiness. I'm a fast cleaner (growing up in and out of foster homes, you learn your way around a vacuum) and I still have an hour to kill after I've done everything outlined for me to do on my 'manual.' So I wander around a bit, enjoying the solitude, and I find a book on the table marked _Sasuke Uchiha_ that I really can't help but look at.

I figured he was an apprentice when I saw him inside the shop waiting to give me my orders, but I didn't know how good he was till I open the book and see some of his work.

_Wow,_ I think, eyes sweeping over the Polaroids, and I'm impressed even though I kind of wish he sucked. _And he's just an APPRENTICE? These are amazing._

I'll be the first to admit, I know next to nothing about tattoos. But even I can tell that I'm looking at some really great shit in this book. Mostly black and gray, a lot of good shading. Really clean. There's even some portraits that look so lifelike, they look more like photographs than tattoos.

He doesn't use color much, though. Here and there, but I can tell his skill is with black and gray.

I glance at my reflection in the ceiling mirror, the pink hair, the green eyes, the white skin, the purple sweatshirt and the yellow shorts and the charcoal tights and the coral slippers, and giggle. No wonder he's having such a hard time with _me._

* * *

**note..** Got my thigh tatted this weekend. Not quite as painful as my ribs were, but I'm a fucking dancer, yo. And getting your muscles tattooed feels like what I imagine the turkey feels like getting carved on Thanksgiving. That being said: FUCKING BEAUTIFUL. I am in love. My husband and I got matching Phillies logos on our wrists when we first started dating; he stopped at that first one. I didn't. I'll be the kickass pediatrician with full tat sleeves and shit. And Philly shops are no joke. My tattoo artist is fabulous, but he works with nutty people who don't bother with stencils, and just freehand that shit. Kind of reminded me of Sasuke. Arrogant as hell to screw with people's skin like that, but with the skill to back it up. By no means is it status quo for a tattoo artist to work without a tracing.

What'd you think? Happy Tuesday, y'all.

xoxoxo Daisy


	4. Linework

Boy meets girl, kind of.

Boy works with girl, kind of.

Boy ignores all the signs that something's supposed to happen with this girl.

Kind of.

* * *

Kakashi's a fucking idiot, and I tell him so.

"Why'd you hire _her?_" I demand the next day I see him.

"Who?" he asks mildly, his attention on his sketchpad as he freehands an (admittedly) awesome pin-up girl on the blank sheet.

"You know who," I grumble at him. "That little shrimpy ballet girl."

"Because she answered the ad," he responds, all innocent as he shades in a skimpy G-string on the big-breasted woman, his bandanna concealing what's got to be a lecherous smirk. "We were in need of a good cleaner. I had Kiba do it last week as punishment for that fuck-up he did on a client…" I remember Zaku's jacked tattoo and hide my smirk. "…but this place was still a shithole. Look around, Sasuke. She was here one night, and it's sparkling."

"It's a tattoo parlor," I mutter, pissed because Kakashi's right, the place looks great. "It's not supposed to _sparkle._ You can't have her working here, she's a girl!"

"Well that's chauvinistic of you."

I'm not sure why I'm so stressed out having Sakura working at Ink and Iron. It's not like we're coworkers or anything. We'll only see each other at shift change, when I close up the shop and she comes in to clean it. Seeing her more frequently doesn't give her some brand-new significance in my life. But something about her has me…edgy. Granted, most things have me edgy, it's one of the downsides to having an inferiority complex (you can thank my gifted older brother for that.) But Sakura…I don't know.

And I'm not fucking _scared_ of her, or anything like that. You'd have to be high to find anything scary in that doll face and those shiny eyes and her stupid smile. She doesn't _scare_ me.

She…unsettles me. Like whenever I see her, I don't fucking know what to do with myself. She threatens me with her impending relevance.

And something tells me I need to stay away from her. She's bad news for me.

"You think about the liability, old man?" I snap, snatching my sketchpad, too, since I might as well make good use of my time here. "Having a little underage girl working alone, after dark?"

"I've thought about it," he responds dismissively.

This is going nowhere. Kakashi's got his reasons for keeping Sakura around, even if I think it's a nightmare. With a sigh of surrender, I settle into my drawing. It's raining outside, there's mud tracked into the shop from all of our clients. Sakura's gonna have a lot to do tonight.

* * *

She's right on time. Not that I was waiting for her or anything, but I get out at eleven when she comes in. So ten minutes before, she breezes inside like she owns the place, still wearing her ballet shit and smiling brightly like this is the most fun she's ever had.

Maybe it is. Girl needs to get out more.

"Hey, Sasuke," she says with a sweet smile, like we're best friends, like we didn't argue the night before. Like she knows me so well.

"Hn."

If she's bothered by how I'm not talking to her, she doesn't show it. She just hangs up her jacket on the coat rack and makes a beeline for the supply closet to get her cleaning things.

"Oh, just so you know," she adds, dragging out a vacuum cleaner that's nearly as big as she is, "I was looking through your design book last night…"

"Is that what Kakashi pays you for?" I snark.

"…and your stuff really is incredible," she finishes, like I didn't even say anything. "I can't believe you're just an apprentice, everything in that book looks amazing!"

She's definitely an amateur, even if her praise strokes my ego the way it likes to be stroked. She doesn't know what to look for in a tattoo to judge it as worth anything, so hearing her gush over it is only semi-rewarding. But for reasons I'm not ready to examine, I decide to push the subject.

"What do you know about it?" I smirk, sitting down on the client sofa and opening the book she was talking about. "How can you tell a tattoo's good or not? Even shitty tattoos look good to the untrained eye."

She pauses on her way to plugging in the vacuum, weighing what I said, and nods. "Yeah, I guess you're right. But…this one right here…"

She doesn't sit down beside me, just stands over me and flips through the pages of my old sketches, then points to one. It's a portrait; some guy came in wanting his girlfriend's face on his bicep. Portraits are crazy hard by themselves, but in a place like a bicep, rounded and hard in some places, soft in others, it was easily one of the hardest tattoos I ever did. Kakashi monitored the whole time but I pulled it off somehow. It's one of the tattoos I'm proudest of, besides my sleeves.

"It's amazing," Sakura says. "You got everything right. It's like I'm looking at a black-and-white photo."

Okay, so she's got good taste.

"I like your sleeves," she adds, gesturing to my arms. Her eyes trace the ink patterns almost enviously. "Did you design them yourself?"

"I _did_ them myself," I correct her, more than a little smug. Not saying I'm under her spell like the rest of our classmates, but the hottest girl at school _is_ fawning all over my work and it's hard not to let it go to my head.

"Really? You're ambidextrous?"

"Hn. Nah." _Just that fucking GOOD._

"Well that's arrogant, then," she says flatly, returning to her vacuum.

"What do you mean, arrogant?" I snap. Who is she to snark at me like that?

"I mean, you just picked up a needle and started drawing on yourself?" She rolls her eyes, plugs in the vacuum, turns it on. The noise grates on my nerves, but not nearly as much as the disapproving expression on her face, like she knows so much better than me.

"Get a tattoo, baby, then you can tell me what's what," I tell her, and I'm shocked, _shocked_ at the words coming out of my mouth. Sure, every other guy who works here calls the chicks that come in here petnames, harmless ones like 'baby' or 'sweetheart' or 'honey,' but I've never called anybody _anything_ but their given name. Ever.

This is what freaks me out about Sakura. I've known the girl for a handful of _days_, spoken to her _three times in my life,_ but already she's becoming an _exception._

I can't have exceptions. I can only have killer marks and golden opportunities.

If Sakura's suspicious of my slip-up, she doesn't show it. "I'd love to," she says conversationally, her voice lilting over the noise the vacuum cleaner makes humming back and forth across the burgundy carpet. "Get a tattoo, that is."

"Then why _don't_ you?" I ask, half-wondering why I even care, but she's got great skin. Pale and smooth and healthy. It would pick up color really well, keep it fresh for a long time. It would be years before it aged on skin like hers.

"I'm a _ballerina,_" she giggles, like it's obvious. "I'd never get hired _anywhere_ with a tattoo. I stand out as it is, pink hair and everything."

Too bad. Something floral would look great on her. She's got toned arms, they'd look good under a half-sleeve, maybe, and…

That's the problem with me, I realize, looking away from Sakura to my guitar case in the corner. I haven't touched it all day. The problem with me, the reason why Itachi was already so successful when he was my age and I'm grasping at straws, is because I don't think like a musician, the way he does.

I think like an artist.

I look at things differently. I look at people like they're blank canvases. I think up things that I think would look good on them, and in the back of my mind, I'm always sketching something.

I like guitar, don't get me wrong. But I don't think up songs the way I think up pictures. I can't put a song to Sakura Haruno, but I'm designing art for her body without even meaning to.

Tch. I'm concerned about the significance this girl might have for me someday, at the same time I'm painting every inch of her body in my mind with indelible ink.

There's something fucking wrong with me. I have to get out of here.

I stand up, leave the sketchbook on the coffee table with the other artists'. Go pick up my guitar (I have a gig coming up, a jam session with Naruto and some of the other guys in our Music Analysis and Performance class, and I haven't touched my guitar all day.) Prepare to leave without a goodbye.

Sakura stops me at the door, all smiles. She thinks we're friends. Stupid girl, I can't let you be relevant to me, pretty skin and all.

"Tell you what though," she says playfully. Is she flirting with me? Does Sakura Haruno flirt with anyone? Is that allowed? "If this whole ballet thing doesn't work out for me, I'll let you tattoo me. As long as you use color, though!"

"Hn. I don't like color."

She smiles like she knows something I don't.

* * *

"I heard you guys hired Sakura Haruno!" Naruto says, injecting her name with a sickening amount of adoration.

He's never even _spoken_ to her.

"She's the night cleaner," I mumble, just because he'll keep pestering me if I don't answer, and I'm trying to enjoy this fajita wrap.

"Aw, man, I thought you'd hire her as a model or something!"

While I can see where he's going with this, that a girl like Sakura is better suited to showing off her killer body compared to scrubbing floors and windows like she's doing, I'm not in the mood for another hours-long monologue about her alleged beauty.

"She's got no ink at all, what would she model for at a tattoo parlor?" I snap.

"You gotta introduce me, man! Does she have a boyfriend, do you think?"

"What do I care?"

Naruto looks at me from across the table with this shit-eating grin on his face. Like he knows so much. It pisses me off, but I ask anyway.

"What the hell are you looking at me like that for?"

"Nothing, man. You just sound really sensitive about the whole thing, that's all. Does wittle Sasukins have a wittle crush on pwetty Sakuwa?"

Is it normal to have fantasies about killing your best friend?

* * *

Itachi doesn't call for the rest of the week.

Instead, I get a string of texts each night, words misspelled or misused, barely legible. He's drinking, still. Heavily. I wonder what else he's taking, but I think I'm happier not knowing.

My brother the hero. My brother the rock star. My brother the celebrity.

Weird, though. How I wish he was just my brother the kid who picked me up from school. The kid who taught me how to play three chords on his old guitar before he gave it to me and went on the road.

If it makes me a pussy to admit it, then whatever, but I really just miss my brother.

* * *

Friday morning, I don't have any classes, so I usually head to the shop early. There's nobody else there, since we don't open till eleven, but it's a surprisingly good place to practice my guitar. Good acoustics. Go figure.

I get there around nine. It's a shitty day, rainy and dark when the sun should be up, even a little bit cold. I shake rainwater out of my hair and fumble with my key, and eventually stumble inside where it's warm and dry and…

I stop dead.

Stupid Sakura's still here.

On the sofa.

_Asleep._

She must never have gone home last night after her shift was over, which would have been about six hours ago. I'm irritated already. What kind of stupid girl spends the night in a tattoo parlor, when she should be in her dorm across campus?

She's asking to get molested, I swear.

_Dumb girl,_ I think, glaring at the way she's curled up on the old, threadbare couch cushions, her arms crossed for warmth, her hair a tangled mess as she sleeps.

"Hey," I snap. I'm not known for my grace or gentility. "_Hey._ Get up, what the hell are you doing?"

She stirs and it takes her a moment to open her eyes. When she does, she sees me, and sits bolt upright, completely startled.

"What? What time is it?" she demands, her voice raspy from sleep. I _refuse_ to admit that I like the sound of her voice like this. _Refuse_ to.

"It's after nine, what the hell are you still doing here?"

"It's after _nine?_" she gasps, and she's on her feet in nanoseconds, yanking her hair into a ponytail as quickly as she can. "Shit, shit, _shit!_"

Hearing a ballerina cuss is like watching a dog walk on its hindlegs. You know it happens every now and then, but it's so fucking weird when it does. The ballerinas at KPAA are like fucking soldiers. They're painfully proper every minute of their lives, they don't swear, they don't show up messy or unprepared for anything.

There's something fucking _different_ about Sakura. The way she drops cuss words like she's been doing it her whole life, the way she takes a bizarre _pride_ in doing a job that requires her to scrub toilets and sinks, the way she doesn't have the same fears a regular girl does about being alone at night all the time.

She's different. She's not like everyone else. I can't figure her out.

And whatever X-factor she has that makes her so unique, _that's_ what's threatening to me. The way she doesn't even mean to do it, but she's making herself _interesting_ to me.

That's what's so terrifying about this girl.

"I'm so fucking _late,_" she moans, seizing her hoodie from the back of the sofa and ripping it over her head. "Miss Suzume's gonna have me running laps for a _month!_"

Fucking neurotic. I should've just let her sleep, she wouldn't be this noisy.

"Sasuke I'm _so sorry._ I swear this won't happen again, I just closed my eyes for a minute and…God, I have to get over to Studio A, she's gonna tear me a new 3-bedroom, 2-bath doublewide _asshole_."

Something different. Something terrifying.

"Crazy bitch," I grumble as she sprints out the door into the pouring rain.

Something _interesting._

If I'm not careful, she's gonna be my downfall.

* * *

**note..** all right, so i've been getting some questions: what tattoos do i have? i've got violets up my side, a phillies logo on my wrist, a tiger on my thigh, stars on my ankle, a disney castle on my shoulder blade, and a tribal tramp stamp. sky's the limit. but what _i _want to know: what tattoos do YOU have?

i do not promise instant romance in this story. please be aware. i promise EVENTUAL romance.

and about this jawn: i write what i know personally. i write about things i've done and been through because those are the only things i can write convincingly. i change all the circumstances, obviously, but i write from my heart, so thank you earthbender068 for recognizing that. i fucking love your reviews, you just fucking get me.

thank you, everyone, for supporting me on this story and all my others (you guys HAVE to be tired of me by now!)

love you, dollfaces. leave some love ;)

xoxo daisy :)


	5. Pirouette

It's not a pleasant scenario, but it is a familiar one. Me, doubled over, hugging the toilet like it's my favorite doll, vomiting my guts out.

Inevitable, though. My newest routine has sixteen pirouettes. And I've been dancing since I could walk but I still have a terribly, terribly weak stomach. I wish I didn't have to spin so much, but a ballerina who can't spin is about as much use as a wheelchair with no wheels.

It's hard to remember when and what I've eaten, I realize, flushing down the physical reminder of all my failures and standing up, wiping the sweat off my forehead. I'm run down. I'm hungry. I'm _starving._

I rinse my mouth out. I keep gum in my bag and I wash my hands and try to restore some semblance of composure to my appearance. One of the first rules of ballet is that you're not allowed to break down in front of others. You cry into your arms late at night and you scream into your pillow, and you put on enough makeup so no one ever sees anything but the perfect, flawless, paragon of beauty and refinement that you are.

In the bathroom of Studio A, no one sees me cry. No one except, naturally, myself. Staring back at me in the mirror is the most _unforgiving judge_ of all of them. Worse than the panel at competitions. Worse than Miss Suzume. Worse than the other girls I dance with who call me "Prima" behind my back and behind their hands. I'm my own worst critic. My own worst _enemy._

The tears come freely when I look at myself underneath the appalling bright fluorescents. I see things about myself I resent. Things I _despise._ My chest aches from the tape around my breasts to bind them back. When I turn slightly, I can see the vertebrae on the back of my neck, sticking out of my skin. My skin that's too pale, almost white because when do I _ever_ see the sun, when do I _ever_ see anything but the polished hardwood floors and wall-length mirror? There are purple bags under my eyes and when I dance, I sweat, and when I sweat, my makeup comes off and there isn't a foundation that can get _deep enough_ into my pores to hide that. My head throbs, a constant headache with my hair pulled up so tight all the time.

I look at this girl, at this _shitshow,_ and I want to cry, so I cry harder. I have about three minutes here, three minutes left to _hate myself_ before I need to get back out there. Miss Suzume won't wait forever. I need to nail those sixteen pirouettes and work on my arabesque for the finale and…

Two minutes of crying, I allow myself, before I take my hair down. Relish the fleeting moment of relief before I scoop it back up in a bun again, smooth the flyaways down until it's perfect. I splash water on my face and reapply a quick coat of ivory foundation, focusing on the bruises under my eyes. I straighten my cami and dust off my shorts, spit out my gum and smile. Freeze the tears in my eyes and force them back, because tears are weakness and I need to be strong, I need to be perfect.

And perfect is what I am when I leave the bathroom and get back into Studio A. My home away from home.

But lately it feels more like my jail cell.

* * *

Back when I was dancing in the dirt-poor studio I was brought up in, me and Ino, the other girls were my dearest friends. We did everything together. We learned. We played. And we loved each other, more than we loved dancing. It was like being brought up with eight sisters. A family.

I don't know why I expected the same thing out of KPAA, but I was sorely mistaken. Because when Ino and I got here, we saw the ugly side to dance. The hideous truth about ballet:

It's competition. 100% of the time, it's unscrupulous, merciless, ruthless, agonizing competition. You can't trust anyone, because they all smile in your face while they vie for your spot. They pretend to care about you, pretend to be your friend, but at this level of dancing, in this elite company, it's every woman for herself. And these girls I dance with would stick a knife in my back if they thought it would up their chances at the next competition.

It's the evening before a performance. Not a competition, just a showcase, but as I'm stretching out, lost in my own thoughts, it's impossible not to register the stares I'm getting. The other girls resent me for my place in our group, for the featured spot I have in this routine. For my work ethic and my _hair_ and _everything about me_ because that's what ballet is, at its core. That's why Ino left.

The _hypocrisy._ The _falsehood._ It's enough to make you _sick._

They call me "Prima." Like prima ballerina. But there's nothing kind about it. It's not a testament to my skill, a playful nickname from a group of caring friends. It's an insult.

They resent me. They hate me, even.

But it keeps me going, it really does. It gives me purpose. A reason to try so hard, since everybody needs a passion. Everybody needs a reason to keep going, to try harder, to be better. And if just to shut these _haters_ the _fuck up_, I'm going to keep on.

There's one exception, though. To all these liars, to all these deceivers, to all these opportunists I work with.

"Hi, S-Sakura," says Hinata with a sweet smile, joining me for a stretch.

Hinata is one of the sweetest, loveliest people anyone ever knew, and she alone is unaffected by that competitive atmosphere. She's a wonderful ballerina, easily the most graceful one out of our entire company. Expressive when she dances, like she loves it. I envy her that. I remember when I used to dance like that.

"Hey," I reply, grinning back. I reach out and grab her hands as we sit on the floor opposite each other, our feet touching so we can stretch out. She pulls me towards her and I relish the burn in my hamstrings. Hold it for a few seconds, then lean back so she can do it, too. "What's up?"

"N-N-Nothing. Just w-working on my sh-showcase."

The showcase isn't for months. It's a year-end recital for everyone in the school. All the parents and families and everyone come and they watch all of us put on a series of performances. A lot of college recruiters, musicians, artists come out to scope out the fresh talent. It's one of the most important nights of the year. We're all working on our acts, but none harder than Hinata Hyuuga.

"Take a private with Miss Suzume," I advise her.

"You're the only one M-Miss Suzume will t-take privates w-with," she reminds me.

Maybe it's not resentment the other girls feel for me. Maybe it's jealousy. And that's even worse, because I'm not in this only for myself, the way they are. I'm in this because once upon a time, this is what I loved to do. And I'm hoping if I keep at it, I'll love it again, someday.

"I'll help you if you want," I suggest, just to avoid my own guilt.

"R-Really? That'd be g-great, there's a s-s-section I'm w-working on, with a…"

"All right, girls!" Miss Suzume's sharp voice cuts across the warm-up, and we all are on our feet in an instant. Like robots, or soldiers, or something else that can't think for itself. "Set up. Watch your spacing. Sakura, stick your pirouettes if you don't want to be here all night long, God knows I'll make you do it. Hyuuga, for God's sake sickle your feet one time in my studio and I'll kick you right out, I swear I will. Tsuchi, same to you. You're grown up now, quit making childish mistakes!"

If Miss Suzume is bad at the start of a rehearsal, she's a nightmare at the end of it. Yanks me aside when we're done just so she can shout in my face. The other girls stick around to watch, all except sweet, wonderful Hinata, and I hate them.

"I should have them revoke your scholarship," she snarls in my face, while I stand there like an abused wife and take it. "'Perfect technique,' they said. _Bullshit._ You still can't pin those turns! I have students in _elementary school_ who can turn better than you!"

I hear stifled (barely stifled) giggles from the corner. They're watching, those other girls, _and_ they're laughing. And it's bullshit. It's not fair. I'm the only one she yells at all the time like this, and it's not fair.

"Without my recommendation," she continues, "you'll go _nowhere._ You can forget KCA. You can forget Broadway. You can forget _everything_. If you keep making these stupid mistakes, I'll send you _right back_ to that little ghetto you crawled out of, do you understand me? A waste of oxygen and a waste of God-given talent, that's all it is, and…"

Eventually, I stop hearing her. It becomes background noise, Miss Suzume's solid stream of vitriol. I'm suppressing it, I realize. Compartmentalizing it until it manifests as something else, like an ulcer. Each insult feels like a knife in my stomach, but I never, ever, ever let it show on my face.

I'm a professional, right?

* * *

"I'm telling you, Forehead. Just quit. Quit and share some of this nice ass ice cream with me."

"You know I can't have ice cream, Pig." _You know I can't have anything._

"You have no idea how much better life is after ballet." Ino speaks with certainty as she takes another giant bite of chocolate marshmallow (my favorite flavor) and hums like it's the most delicious thing she ever tasted. "It's like…it's like breathing easy for the first time. I can do whatever I want. _Eat_ whatever I want."

"You say that, but you have a perfect body." There's envy in my tone. Ino doesn't have to hide her breasts or obsess over her weight.

"And you _would_ have a perfect body if you gained a few pounds. You're like, emaciated."

My hand flies self-consciously to my stomach, and I pretend to read some more of my textbook.

It's a quiet night in our dorms. Ino and I are supposed to be studying, but we're both tired, so instead we're half-ass reading and mostly watching TV. It's one of the few times I'm really, genuinely relaxed. My hair's down, still damp from a shower, and there's no tape around my breasts to constrict them. In fact, if Ino would just shut up about me quitting ballet, then it would be perfect. That, and the fact that I'll have to kick Ino out in about an hour so I can get to work.

"Oh, that's what I wanted to talk to you about!" Ino says suddenly, sitting up abruptly in bed and pinning me with this lethal glare. "That's right…I was in rehearsals at Studio D today and Ami Watanabe came in looking all pissed. You know she's really into Sasuke Uchiha, right? Like on a creepy level?"

"Hahaha yeah. Most girls here are. So?"

Not that I don't blame them, really. If you can overlook the fact that he's an arrogant douchebag, Sasuke's definitely nothing to kick out of bed.

Ha. Like I'd know. The cleancut _virgin._

"_So_ she was saying how she overheard Kin talking to Zaku the other night about how Sasuke _totally_ cockblocked him to you! Why the hell am I overhearing someone else's conversation about that, you should've told me yourself you were talking to Sasuke Uchiha!"

"I'm not talking to him!" I protest, tossing a pillow at her. "Calm your tits. He saw Zaku come onto me the other night coming back from practice, that's all. Kinda got in the way, I'm really not sure why he did it, but Zaku hasn't bothered me since then, so I guess I can't complain…"

"He's into you!" Ino exclaims, eyes wide and gleeful. She loves this shit, eats it right up, this useless gossip. "Holy shit, it's fucking fate, man!"

"He is _not_ into me." Of this, I am completely certain. He's just pushy. Arrogant and noble sometimes, when it suits him. But he's also a real jerk. We talk every now and then at shift change, when he leaves Kakashi's Ink and Iron and I go in to clean, but it's usually barbed wire on both ends. I don't dislike him or anything, but he's definitely not my favorite person, either. "We know each other from…"

I pause. No one besides the people over at Kakashi's know about my part-time job. I withheld it from everyone so they wouldn't pry, and so no one would let Miss Suzume know I had taken on another commitment. It's bad enough being the poor girl in the company, I don't need the stress of letting everyone know just _how_ poor. I didn't even tell Ino, my best friend, and now I'm starting to feel guilty about it. You don't hide things from your best friend.

"…Kakashi's Ink and Iron."

"The tattoo shop by the studio?" Ino asks, interested. "What are you doing at a tattoo shop?"

"I'm…the cleaner," I reveal casually, returning to my reading.

"Wait, seriously?"

"You know I don't have much money," I bite out, offended. "I work third shift during the week to help pay for dance, you have a problem with that?"

"No," she snaps back, never afraid to go toe-to-toe with me, "just that you never bothered to tell me! Sakura third shift is no joke, especially on top of everything else you have going on! Ballet isn't the _only_ dance club we have at KPAA, no one would look down on you if you joined our hiphop group, or the contemporaries over at Studio K, or…"

"I'm not having this conversation," I say sharply, closing my book and standing up. "I'll be late to my shift if I don't leave now," I lie, my voice stiff, because I'm still really, really early. "Go hang out with Sai. Boss _him_ around for a change."

"If you think I'm bossing you _around,_ Forehead, then…"

"I don't need this from you!" I explode. "Damn it, Ino, I'm trying my best here, okay? I don't need you on my back all the time telling me it's not good enough!"

I hear it from her. I hear it from everyone. Sakura, give more. Sakura, do more. Sakura, try harder. Sakura, not good enough. Not enough. Never enough. I can't take it anymore.

"I know I'm a fucking broken record, Sakura, but I'm only saying this because I'm _worried_ about you!" She's standing up, too, blonde hair flying, blue eyes shiny with concern. Genuine concern, because Ino is maybe the only person in the world who genuinely knows me and genuinely loves me. And I'm a giant bitch for taking my frustrations out on her, but who else can I scream at without burning bridges I'll need to cross someday? Who else will forgive me for being a collossal dickhead?

"I don't need your worry," I snap, jamming my feet into a pair of Chuck Taylors.

"You barely eat anything, you think I haven't noticed that? You never sleep, you're in the studio all the time and now you're working at a _tattoo shop_ in the middle of the night? Sakura you're gonna get yourself _killed_ pushing yourself this hard! Ballet used to be something _fun,_ remember? But the party's over!"

"I'll be back at three am," I hiss, seizing my key ring and storming out of the room.

She better not be there when I get back. Judgmental, condescending, patronizing _bitch._

(I hope she's there.)

* * *

"I know I'm early," I bark at Sasuke, who looks at me with raised eyebrows from behind the counter. "I don't care. I won't clock in till eleven. I just had to leave."

He doesn't seem at all interested anymore, just returns to counting the cash in the register. "Whatever."

One thing I like about Sasuke? He doesn't pry.

It's too early to start cleaning. There are still customers in the shop, and a good handful of artists working on them. It wouldn't look good to have the cleaning girl starting in on her job while there are still people there. Makes customers feel like they're being rushed along.

And say what you want about me, but I know exactly how appearances work. I'm a people pleaser.

So instead, I sit down in the empty seat next to Sasuke. I'm all fired up from my fight with Ino and looking to fight some more, so I hope he starts in on me, but for once, Sasuke doesn't seem to want to argue with me. He's quiet as he counts the money, his long, strong fingers moving quickly, lips moving silently as he organizes bills by denomination. Makes sure they're facing the same way.

"You guys make a lot of money, huh?" I say, just for something to do. My heart's calming down now. The adrenaline's leaving my body, but that's not good, either, since I know once I calm down all the way, I'll be exhausted, and I still have an _entire_ shop to clean.

"Aa. We're the only shop in town."

"Really. I thought for sure you'd say you were the _best_ shop in town."

He smirks. The look is ridiculously attractive. "Same difference."

Sasuke really is good-looking. It's a shame it's all wasted on his awful personality. I can't believe I'm attracted to his type (the whole heavily-tatted thing just wasn't for me before) but I really am. In the simple T-shirt he's wearing, I can see his sleeve tattoos, and his jeans fit him really well. There's an artfully-tousled look to his hair that he's really rocking like a pro, and he's all angles and lines, just like his tattoos.

I realize I'm staring, but there's nothing else to _do._ I'm just killing time till I can start working again.

"By your logic, though, you're also the worst shop in town," I press, just to get a rise out of him.

"Shut up, Sakura."

"Oi, Sasuke!" a boy calls from one of the curtained-off rooms in the back. He leans out, and I see purple triangles tattooed on his cheeks. _Badass. _"Quit flirting over there and help me with this design! I gotta put this on a thigh tomorrow night and it's not fucking working."

Sasuke sighs, long-suffering, and wraps the money up in a paper. Drops it in the safe. "Don't touch anything," he orders me darkly, before joining the boy with the face tats in the back, and leaving me to my own devices minding the counter.

I spend the rest of the time until 11 pm swinging my legs and looking around the lobby with interest. There are a lot of interesting people here, people of all different shapes and sizes with all kinds of art all over their body. You don't get a lot of variation over at Studio A, where everyone moves the same and dresses the same and looks the same. It's nice to see a little diversity every once in awhile.

After awhile, Sasuke and the boy with the face tats emerge from the back. Everyone's getting ready to go, which means I'm getting ready to work. I hop down off my chair and start for the closet.

"So you're the new cleaning girl, huh?" the other boy asks with a toothy smile. He's good-looking, but next to Sasuke, it's not even fair. "You're cute. What's your name?"

"I'm Sakura, nice to meet you," I reply with a smile.

"Kiba," he replies. "Pleasure's all mine. You go to KPAA, right? Ballet, I'm guessing?"

"Yeah, is it that obvious?"

"Only a little. I go there, too. I play bass."

"Oh, really? That's awesome. I'm sorry, most of my time is spent at the studio with the other ballet girls, I don't know too many people there personally."

"I wish you'd change your mind then," Kiba says with a sly smile.

Sasuke rolls his eyes, then looks at me. "Get to work."

"You're not my boss," I grumble at him, pushing past him to get my vacuum.

"You tell him, Sakura," Kiba laughs. "All right, see you tomorrow night, man. Nice meeting you, Sakura, see you around!"

With that, he leaves, and everyone else is gone, too. It's just me and Sasuke.

He sits down on the plush couch with his sketchpad, and he doesn't talk to me or even really look up. There's the scratching of charcoal on the paper, and I really want to see what he's drawing. For as much as Sasuke irritates me as a person, he fascinates me as an artist. I'd love to be able to draw like he does. All I can do is dance.

But I keep to myself. Focus on cleaning. Focus on polishing the ornate wizard statue on prominent display in the store window. Pewter, of all things. It's annoying to shine.

"You fell asleep here again the other night," Sasuke says suddenly, his voice soft.

I bristle. It was an accident, but that's three nights now I've dozed off on the Ink and Iron sofa, too tired to make it back to my room.

"I didn't mean to, it won't happen again," I mutter defensively.

"You're tired all the time." He's looking at me now, dark eyes locked on me over the edge of his sketchpad. And it annoys me, how he's all expectant. Like I'm supposed to dish to him the reasons why, like he's one of my girlfriends.

"I'm a dancer," I say. Dismissive. Stop asking questions.

"You're a pain in the ass," he corrects me. "If you can't handle this job, you shouldn't be here."

"I CAN handle it!" I argue, throwing my rag down and rounding on him, hellbent on screaming in his face. "God, who are _you_ to snark at me like that? I do this job well, this place was falling apart before I got here and now it's so clean you can eat off the floor! What is your _problem?_ Why are you always on my case?"

"Calm down," Sasuke orders sharply, and there's an expression I don't really recognize in his eyes. Almost…alarmed? He puts his charcoal down, and I see the dark stain on his fingers it's left behind. "You look like you're about to fall over…"

I'm dizzy. I'm dizzy and I'm frustrated and I'm _angry,_ and I'm hungry and I hate myself and I'm stressed but most of all I am _tired._ I want to sleep, but more than that, I want to _rest._

"I get it from everyone!" I scream at him, tears in my eyes. Falling apart the way a ballerina is never supposed to fall apart. "Everyone all the time, telling me I'm not good enough, telling me I should just quit, telling me I'm _useless,_ I'm _sick_ of it! You don't even know me, Sasuke! I need this fucking job! I'd work a pole if that was all I could find and if I get a little _tired_ when I'm done, _fuck you!_ I'm trying my _best,_ why isn't that good enough for you?"

This is about more than Sasuke, this tantrum. Sasuke isn't the root of all this anger. He's not the cause. But he's definitely the outlet. The scapegoat. I look at his handsome face and I don't see Sasuke the person. I see Miss Suzume's disapproving snarl. I see the irritated expressions of all of my foster parents because all I ever did was get in the way. I see Ino's grating concern for my wellbeing and my own total _inadequacy_ and I want to cry, so I do.

"Sakura, knock it off," Sasuke orders me, and I'm stunned to feel his fingers wrap tightly around my upper arms. Sasuke's touching me, but I'm so fucked up all I can think of is I hope his fingers don't leave charcoal smudges on this practice shirt, Miss Suzume would kill me. "You're gonna pass out if you keep this up. Calm down."

"I just…I just…Sasuke I just want to _rest,_" I whisper, tears streaming from my eyes. I know I must look demented right now, but for once, I don't care. I want to stop moving. I want to calm down. I want to breathe. I look up at him, and it's got to be pitiful, _pathetic_ even, but Sasuke doesn't roll his eyes at me, doesn't laugh, doesn't dismiss me. He just stares at me and I swear to you, I swear in this moment, he understands me. I can't explain it. How could he know what I'm going through? We've got _nothing_ in common, he knows nothing about me and I know nothing about him, but I know, right down to my gut, that he knows what it's like. To push and push and move and want nothing more than to stop, for a second. He gets me right then, I know it.

"Lay down," he tells me softly. He nods to the couch he was just sitting on.

"I can't," I sniffle. "I have to clean. I have to finish with the…"

"Just stop. Lay down. I won't tell Kakashi."

I'm too tired to argue with him. Too tired to head back to my dorm and fall apart there. Too tired to do anything but obey, and my heart is full of gratitude for Sasuke Uchiha in that moment. He's no saint, no hero. He's a real asshole, but he's got a heart somewhere.

I'm asleep as soon as my head hits the cushion.

I wake up with a leather jacket I've never seen before tossed over my shoulders, sunlight streaming in through the windows and warming my face, and a note from Sasuke taped to my time card.

_Breakfast. 9:30 at Ichiraku's._

* * *

__**note..** hey everybody :) i have strep throat, so you have chapter five. (i miss my philly bars. i've been sick for a coon's age.)

hope you enjoyed. let me know if you did!

xoxo daisy :)


	6. Design

Ichiraku's is always crowded this early in the morning. Mostly it's the theater kids on their way to rehearsal, or whatever. It's the only diner nearby that doesn't overcharge on waffles, and it's a block from campus, so KPAA kids are always in and out. Lugging easels and instrument cases, there are so many people here, you kind of just blend in after awhile.

The Java Bean is a lot more subdued, a lot quieter, a lot less busy. More private, but then again, you're a lot easier to notice in an empty room. And me, I attract enough attention as it is. If I can avoid it, I will.

So I'm sitting here at a two-person table in the corner with a coffee in my hands, paper cup since Styrofoam makes my teeth grind, just another nameless KPAA student in a sea of KPAA students, and I'm waiting for a girl without a real reason _why._

Sakura should be irrelevant to me, but she's not.

I don't know why it matters to me that she broke the fuck down at Ink and Iron last night, but it does.

I don't know why I feel the need to talk to her, argue with her, grill her for information but I do.

So here I am. Trusting my instincts, I guess.

It's 9:34. She's late. That's annoying to me. Like nearly everything else about her, that's annoying to me.

Maybe most annoying of all, though, is the fact that I fucking understand her.

I sneer into my coffee at the sheer absurdity of it all, but that's that shitty irony, isn't it? That I spent my whole life trying to cultivate my own identity, watering a garden, so to speak, of what I thought was individuality. Carved myself a niche as the brooding, misunderstood, underappreciated younger brother of a dying star. No one like me in the world. Alone. Original. Individual.

And then this girl comes along, literally dancing into my life with a pink ponytail and little ballet slippers and a vacuum that's half almost as tall as she is, and we're polar opposites, and we've got _nothing_ in common besides our alma mater, and we barely know shit about each other, and she winds up being someone I completely just fucking _get._ I'm not alone. I'm not original. I'm not even an individual.

I'm some guy who met some girl, and we're alike even if we're completely different, and that matters now, for reasons I don't even want to try to understand.

But here I am, nonetheless. Drinking shitty coffee out of a paper cup and waiting for some dumb little dancer girl to show up, so I can have a conversation about shit I'm not ready to discuss.

And there she is, 9:41. Looks a damn sight better than she did last night, screaming and crying and carrying on and messy-haired. Must've showered after she woke up. Again. On the lumpy red sofa of a tattoo parlor. Looks around a few times, that fucking ponytail swinging back and forth, tries to find me. Eventually does.

She's got a gym bag slung across one shoulder as she excuses herself through the crowd of other customers to reach my table, a heavy one by the look of it, and in her arms is a black leather jacket. Mine. She smiles beautifully at me, a practiced smile, and sits down at the empty chair across from mine.

"Hey," she says airily. Like nothing happened before. Like she didn't fall asleep on the same couch as me, our legs touching. Like she didn't scream at me all the anger she's kept inside of her for years and years. Like she's not some image-obsessed headcase even when I know she fucking is. "Here's your jacket back. Thank you."

I take it without a word. I keep staring at her instead. It's not my fault. I've got an artist's eye.

Her hair's yanked back into a ponytail, like it almost always is when I see her around campus, tight and smooth, no bumps or flyaways. Bangs pinned back off her forehead, makeup minimal. Concentrated mostly around her eyes. She's got an eye for color, I'll give her that; knows just how to doll herself up with a minimalist pallette to enhance that fucking flawless beauty I just don't buy into. She's wearing loose dancer's clothes and a smile I don't buy into, either.

She's playing a part again, I realize. That's why she's so much more annoying to me right now than she is when we're at work together; at least there, she lets her hair down. Figuratively.

Here, in front of everyone, she's not Sakura, the irritating, opinionated, stubborn girl who scrubs floors, buffs leather client's chairs and shines a pewter silver wizard after midnight.

Nope. It's showtime for her. And she's Sakura Haruno, the ballerina. The object of every guy's fantasies, of every girl's envy. Perfect. Flawless. Composed. Regal. Unaffected.

_And I don't buy it._

There's beauty in flaws. Beauty in a breakdown.

Last night, she was dazzling.

"What'd you wanna see me about, Sasuke?" she asks me.

But the waitress interrupts me before I can say anything. A harried-looking girl with brown hair, but she perks up when she sees she's waiting on Sakura.

"Hey, sweetheart," she says with a grin. "The usual?"

"Yes, thanks, Ayame, you're the best," Sakura replies sweetly. And Ayame – I guess that's her name, weird how Sakura seems to know everyone, to remember the people she doesn't have any time for – rushes off to get her whatever the usual is, and me and Sakura are sitting here across from each other, understanding each other but not quite actually speaking the words.

It's fucking surreal, man. Each of us realizing we're alike in all the ways that matter – in the shallow imitations of perfection we strive for, the grotesque reality of being a fixture in the limelight, slaves to our careers even though we're just fucking _kids_ – but pretending like we don't know. Like we're just friendly acquaintances instead of kindred spirits. Like nothing's changed.

Well hell, I guess that makes us both liars.

"Sasuke?" she prompts, but like hell am I gonna break first. If she wants to keep playing, let her keep playing.

"Hn."

She's quiet, too. When Ayame comes back with her coffee – some sickeningly sweet shit with sugar on the rim – and asks for our breakfast order, she's quiet then, too. Shakes her head almost sadly, and turns to her coffee without looking up.

I frown.

"Get something to eat," I tell her. Bossy, demanding asshole that I am, it feels wrong to eat breakfast with someone who's not eating themselves.

"I'm not hungry," she insists promptly, like she was expecting the discussion in the first place.

Then things start to fall into place for me. More pieces to the puzzle. Bonus pieces. I start to see things I was missing before, like the way her slender frame borders _almost_ kind of close to _too_ skinny. It's a common problem with dancers. Even I know that.

"Yes you are."

Green eyes, made up at the corners and striking, snap up to me and they're dangerous all of a sudden. Forbidding. _We are not going into this,_ they tell me.

"I'm not. I have a competition tonight. Will you be there?"

"Hn. Why would I be."

"Because I asked you."

"And who are _you_ to ask me?" I demand.

"Your coworker," she replies evenly, sipping from her coffee and looking serene, except for that anger in her eyes that I think might be falling in love with. That honest, raw _anger_ that makes her human somehow. "And…"

The anger breaks, but it turns into something else. Something _besides_ the rehearsed little princess act she pulls with everyone else: trepidation. She's nervous. She's out of her element. She's confused like I am, and plowing forward and she's about to make a mistake.

"And your friend."

_Friend._ And what makes you think you can be friends with me, sweetheart? What makes you think I need you around?

"I just…I don't know, Sasuke. I feel…different around you. I feel like we could be friends, if we gave it a shot. You're a good guy underneath all that fucking attitude, and…and I'd like to be friends. And friends hang out with each other, right, but I don't have a fucking social life, I have _ballet._" She spits it like a swear. I feel the same way about goddamn _music,_ but I won't go into that now, all the ways she's like me and I'm like her. "So…maybe you could see that. My performance. And maybe if you see what it is that I do, the way I've seen what it is that _you_ do…"

She trails off, and I don't know what she's getting at. But there's uncertainty in her eyes and boldness on her lips. And something tells me she's bad news, she's the goddamn Grim Reaper for me, she's gonna sink her blunt little nails into my reality and change it into something new if I let her, but what the fuck am I supposed to do? I'm the one who invited her to breakfast with nothing to say.

"Actually," she says, correcting herself. "Don't bother with the competition. You'd be bored to death. But if you really want to fucking know me, if you want to see why I am the way I am…why don't you come to the rehearsal tonight. It's in the auditorium where the competition will be. Open to everyone."

"Why would I go to that?" I demand. _What makes you think I want to understand why you are the way you are?_

_What makes you think I don't already?_

"Just in case you do," she says fairly. "It's not a big deal either way. But I want to be friends with you, Sasuke. And I think you want to be friends with me. Or you wouldn't have called me here this morning, and you wouldn't be sulking that I didn't show up on time."

And even if I don't want to admit it or anything, part of me wants to see Sakura dance. In her element, doing what she says she's supposed to love. I want to see if she's as good as everyone says she is, if she's worth all the hype. If maybe there's something to her talent that's making her frustratingly relevant to me, and once I see it for myself, it'll be easier to ignore.

We're not friends. We're not gonna be friends. We _can't_ be friends.

"Fine," I hear myself say, as the waitress – Ayame – hands me a plate of eggs and bacon and toast.

Except I guess we are.

Sakura takes a piece of toast off my plate and with a shy smile, a shy, _honest_ smile, takes a bite.

* * *

Naruto and I get seats in the upper level of the school theater. It's a massive place, looks more like an opera house than anything, and it's where most of the KPAA recitals are held throughout the year. This one kicks off the holiday season. It's full of people getting things ready for the competition, hanging lights and checking speakers and testing the acoustics.

People are milling around in the aisles and in the seats, wasting time and watching all the dancers onstage rehearsing their routines.

Ballet is so fucking boring to me. I realize it's a shallow mindset to take, especially coming from a performing arts student, but it is. And I know it's supposed to be one of the hardest, most physically demanding activities you can try, but it's fucking boring. I don't care about it.

But I'm here.

"So what're we doing here, man?" Naruto asks me. Only he's dumb enough to come with me to this dumb shit without even knowing the reason why. "Scopin' out the ballet chicks? You already know they're too uptight to hang out with any of us."

_Speak for yourself,_ I think stiffly.

"Sakura told me to come," I say instead.

"I fucking _knew_ you had a thing for her!" he snickers, almost jubilant, because he's fucking stupid and seeing things that aren't there. "Who could blame you, though, she's basically Aphrodite in a tutu."

I'm stunned that Naruto can even _pronounce_ "Aphrodite," so I don't bother yelling at him. Instead, I turn my lazy, bored attention onto the dance instructor currently screaming at everyone onstage.

She's a tall, intimidating-looking woman. Hard edges, no soft lines. Curly hair perfectly set, glasses on her nose, clapping her hands and shouting herself hoarse at everyone around her. Looks like a bitch to my eyes.

"Hopeless, all of you!" she snaps. "Lazy, sloppy, _sickled feet!_ Clear out of here. Let's go, Sakura. Run through your solo. From the sixteenth count. Run it, Tsuchi!"

Music starts playing and Sakura floats onstage from behind the thick burgundy curtains. She's wearing her costume instead of her practice clothing, and this time, I'm watching her not with an artist's eye, but a man's. It's short and tight, soft yellow and lace, her hair up in a bun and her expression dreamy as she takes her position.

And when she starts to dance, I'm fucking transported. Transported to some unearthly universe where ballet isn't fucking unwatchable.

I know _nothing_ about this shit, but it's clear she's fucking good. She points her toes and hops around and spins – I don't know the words for whatever moves she's pulling, but like hell could any normal girl bend her body like that without breaking – and _commands_ your attention. It's like she's telling a story with her legs and her arms and her face, and I realize, to my stupid fucking _horror,_ that I could easily watch this for hours without getting bored. Just Sakura, alone centerstage, moving to music and casting that witchy spell that's made everyone fall in love with her.

Then – halfway through the song – that dance instructor cuts the music. Sakura pulls to a stop quickly, looks up for assessment, and the woman gets right in her face. Starts screaming again.

"If you think you can pull a choreography change midway through the dance without a KCA recruiter spotting it immediately, think again! Do I need to remind you how important this competition is? After that _terrible_ performance last week, you owe it to yourself and to this company to dance like you're _worth_ all that scholarship money we threw at you!"

Apparently, I'm not the only one who's borderline _appalled_ at the way she's screaming at Sakura, who to my eyes, danced like a professional; next to me, Naruto's jaw drops. Scandalized, that someone's criticizing _the_ Sakura Haruno like that.

I hear giggling and look at the other girls onstage, in the wings, not quite hidden by the curtains. The girls who were dancing before in a group, the ones who couldn't hold a candle to Sakura, are huddled together pointing and laughing as that bitch instructor tears her a new one. And Sakura doesn't say anything to defend herself, just nods and takes it bent over and submissive.

Like a dog that's been abused for so many years, it's grown to expect nothing else.

She's clearly the best thing there. Even to someone like me who doesn't give a shit about this nonsense, I can say she's got more talent than all of them. So what this instructor does is she loads up all kinds of pressure on her, beats her down, and humiliates her in front of the other girls just to get the best out of her. And Sakura just fucking takes it.

I don't want to feel sympathy for her, and I don't. She's free to make her own choices, ain't she. She can leave anytime she wants if she thinks it's too much.

But I'm starting to understand her even better.

"And if you don't start watching what goes in your mouth," the instructor goes on, rambling about, of all things, Sakura's _weight,_ "then you won't fit into your end-of-year recital costume. Trust me, KCA isn't looking for ballerinas who need to be outfitted in _circus tents._"

Her stress levels. Her exhaustion. Her food anxiety.

All of it, everything that makes Sakura Haruno such a sparkling shitshow, is rooted in ballet. Something that she claims is her biggest passion.

All of it, keeping her locked inside a cage of shattered dreams and lifelong disappointments. And ambition is a chain stronger than steel, because once you lose that, what are you left with? Nothing. And I understand that.

It's why I keep writing songs without any real meaning behind them. Why I show up to music class. Why I tune my guitar like I give a shit what it sounds like, when really I wouldn't mind chucking it right into the river and watching it sink.

Because years ago, it was my passion. It was my world. Being as good as my brother, _beating_ my brother, that was _everything._ Then along came tattooing and I realized maybe there was something else I could do, but the damage was done. I already told the world and myself that my future was music. Nothing else. Going places. KPAA. Here I am.

If I let that go – the person everyone thinks I am – then I have no identity. There's nothing left of me.

And like Sakura, I'm a slave to my image. For as much as I resent it.

And then – almost on cue – I watch Sakura as her instructor moves away from her to go scream at somebody else for a minute. She exhales heavily, breathing hard since that had to be tiring, dancing like that, then looks out into the audience. Up at me. Right at me.

She smiles. It's sad. It's the saddest thing I've ever seen.

And she's never been more beautiful.

* * *

I don't stay for the whole competition. I don't need to, to know that Sakura will win.

Instead I call my brother's cell phone once I get back to my dorm.

He doesn't answer. He almost never does, when I call him. Eventually he'll get back to me, but more often than not, it's when he's been drinking. Or smoking. Or shooting something into his veins he'd kill me for even considering to do myself.

Itachi's a slave to his image, too. The people want a rock star, don't they? And that's what he'll be, even if (until) it kills him.

"Hey, man. It's me. Sasuke. Just…I don't know. It's all starting to…kind of not make sense anymore. Or maybe it's making _too_ much sense, and I just don't want to understand it. This music thing…I'm not saying I hate it. Just that…I don't know what I'm saying. Anyway. See you soon, I guess."

I hang up. And I pick up my guitar, but I don't play a single goddamn note.

Instead, I picture that stunning, _beautiful_ smile Sakura gave me, that smile full of all the sadness and all the heartache and all the disappointment in the world, and without really thinking about it, I set my guitar back in its beaten-up leather case, and I pick up my sketchpad instead.

The designs never came easier.

* * *

**note..** hey, everybody! snowy enough for you?

i don't know what the hell was wrong with the site earlier, but for those of you who were wondering, no i did not delete a chapter off of "limit." i posted the most recent chapter last night and it looks like you can view it now, if you were having trouble seeing it earlier. LAME. hopefully it doesn't happen again.

anyway. if you liked it, let me know :)

xoxo daisy :)


	7. Glissade

I guess I should hate Miss Suzume by now.

Everyone else does, and she must be used to it. You don't get to be that harsh without knowing you're not everyone's favorite person.

I'm not a big fan of hers, don't get me wrong. She's mean, and overly criticial, and severe, and nasty, and sometimes cruel. But she's also preparing us for What's Out There when we graduate KPAA and move on.

And in ballet, the horrible reality is that _everyone_ is mean and overly critical and severe and nasty and cruel. She's not a bitch just for the sake of being one. She's trying to toughen us up so we can handle the bitter, scrutinized, dog-eat-dog world we're going to be entering when we're done here. So yeah, I don't particularly like her, but I do appreciate this.

I do appreciate this.

I do.

(If I tell myself the same thing over and over, I start to believe it.)

It's just like dance. Miss a turn, then you do that turn 20 times so you don't fuck it up again. Bend your knee, then do thirty extensions so it hurts and you don't forget. Feel like ballet life just isn't enough? Tell yourself 3000 times that it is, until you believe it yourself.

Practice makes perfect.

* * *

"D-Did you hear?" asks sweet, gentle little Hinata at practice that afternoon. She rushes up to me with excitement in her dove-colored eyes, her perfect shiny black ponytail bouncing back and forth in her enthusiasm. She joins me for my stretches in a corner of the practice room and waits for me to press her for details.

"Hear what?" I ask indulgently. I like Hinata. She's pretty, and I love pretty things. I envy her perfect figure, her perfect hair, her breathtakingly beautiful eyes.

"There's g-gonna be _r-r-recruiters_. At our h-holiday sh-showcase!"

Of course I've heard it. Miss Suzume's only beaten it into me a thousand times since the beginning of competition season; I know why she gave me the heads-up, though, ahead of the other girls. It's because I'm her star, and I'm likeliest to be snatched up by a great school, and her best chance at getting recognized for pumping out amazing talent.

The fact that I'm an anorexic neurotic with a dwindling personality is just something I have to hide.

"That's awesome!" I say instead with a smile, extending my left leg into the air with my hand cupped around my heel. I remember how hard this used to be, before I devoted an unholy amount of time to improving my flexibility. Now, it's the easiest thing in the world; there's no strain in my muscles anymore that tells me it hurts. Practice makes perfect.

"And…M-Miss Suzume's g-g-giving me a f-featured part in o-our r-routine!" she adds, with a fierce, fierce blush that tells me she's so, so pleased with herself that she can't even contain it, but painfully shy and modest at the same time. It's endearing, and it's why I like Hinata so much. In this whole company with all these cutthroat, two-faced, hypocritical opportunists, she's unbelievably genuine.

"Really?!" I exclaim, happy for her in a way I just can't find the energy to be for myself anymore. "Hinata that's amazing, this is your chance to get discovered!"

"W-Will you help m-me on it?"

"Of course!"

Then Hinata blushes again in the middle of her stretch, and says in her quiet little voice, "You're n-nothing like wh-what everyone else s-s-says you are."

I raise my eyebrows at her, more amused than anything. "And what does everyone say I'm like?" Like I don't already know.

She hesitates, then murmurs, "A backstabber. They s-s-say you'll d-do anything to g-get ahead."

I reflect on all the practices I've spent with these girls, warming up alone in a corner somewhere while they congregated like best, best friends, ignoring the twinge of loneliness that always threatened to break my concentration. Ignoring their suspicious, jealous glares and their nasty, spiteful giggles when it's my turn to be taken to task for a mistake in the routine. Ignoring the feelings until they iced over, with enough practice.

"Dance is all about perception," I hear myself say, evasively. I pretend like her words don't sting, but they do. They always do. And just because I know what everybody here thinks of me doesn't make it any easier to deal with. There's still a little girl inside me who just wants to be friends with everybody. Who doesn't want to warm up by herself.

"I don't agree w-with them, S-Sakura," Hinata tells me quietly, like she's confessing a deep dark secret. "I th-think you're a v-very kind, very s-sad, very l-l-lonely girl…and they're on-only jealous of y-you."

I'm struck dumb by Hinata's opinion of me, so different from anything else I've heard before. Different from the other dancers calling me ruthless, a kissass, a stab-your-back-to-get-ahead opportunist even though that's exactly what _they_ are. Different from the kids on campus who want to act like they know me but don't, who tell me I'm popular while I rot inside from solitude because no one understands me, who look up to me like I'm some kind of queen when all I've ever really wanted was to be really good at what I really loved. Different from Miss Suzume, who regards me as her meal ticket and her cash cow and and and…

I don't think anymore for the rest of the rehearsal, about anything except hitting my marks and nailing my turns. And Miss Suzume barely yells at me at all, she's too busy polishing my first place trophy from the competition last weekend to remember that I gained a pound this week.

* * *

She called me 'lonely.'

I'm in Practice Studio E at the moment, running my solo feature in front of the unforgiving mirrors for the hundredth time. Alone, because that's how I prefer to work. No other dancers to distract me, no painfully insightful ballerina with eyes that see too much to analyze me. No one but myself. It's late, almost time for work, but I feel like I need this. Just a chance not only to polish up my routine, but because I need to blow off some steam, and the rehearsal wasn't enough.

I can't tune Hinata's assessment out, though. It's one of the drawbacks to being a part of this industry. Without wanting to, you internalize every remark made about you, every analysis, every criticism, and it gets into your head. Affects the way you do things. Changes who you are, and how you view yourself. And she called me 'lonely,' of all things.

It's amazing how perfectly on the money someone can be, someone who knows you just a little bit better than you know yourself.

My feet hurt, but it's an easy, familiar pain to ignore as I run through the counts, drowning in what Hinata said about me and how I feel about it. _Lonely._ At first, I want to scoff, laugh it off. I'm not lonely. Ino's been my best friend for years; I'm constantly among people, with the other girls in rehearsal and with the other students in class. People try to hang out with me, try to be near me, know who I am. Even at Ink and Iron, Sasuke's been working on his designs in that tattoo shop while I'm cleaning, so I'm not really alone there, either. There aren't many moments a day like this one, where no one's around.

But can't you be lonely in a sea of people? Isolated from them as they are from you? For everyone who counts me as someone as popular as Ino, as well-liked as Ino, as admired as Ino, I wonder if they even know me as anything more than a name. An ideal. And one I just don't feel like living up to anymore. Because what's at the top?

Nothing. More loneliness.

And do I want a lifetime of _this?_ I ask myself, and to my horror, I feel tears burning in my eyes. What is _with_ me lately? All this crying all the time? I tune out the threatening breakdown, dance harder, start to let go a bit as I really ponder that fucking question. Is this really what I want?

Is this what I want to do _forever?_ To be the best in this field, to know that I'm more talented than the others, that I'm better, that my technique is more polished and my flexibility is second to none and my stamina's improved and I'm _best,_ but for none of that to be enough when I look at myself in the mirror? To spend more long hours in rehearsal with my back to people who hate me for my skill, who mock me to bring me down to their level, who resent me for my gutterbutt upbringing and just because I am who I am? To waste away to nothing, hating every single thing about myself I used to love, until I've become a shell of not only who I once was, but who I'll never be?

_It's got to be enough, _I think wildly, screwing my eyes shut against the tears and dancing as fast and as hard as I can. For once. My technique is awful at the moment as my heartrate picks up, as I let out gasps of struggle and effort; my carefully-honed restraint not only slips, it fucking _disintegrates_ and I'm moving without any precision at all. Everything I'm known for, it breaks down right along with me and I move like an animal, like there's hell on my heels and the tears come faster and this isn't it, is it? This isn't what I want. This isn't what I thought it would be.

"Fuck it," I snarl, more animal than human. My voice reverberates off the walls and cussing in rehearsal, if anybody else were to hear me, would result in 40 pushups, but I'm alone, so I say it again. "_FUCK IT!"_

My routine flies out the window. I let myself go, completely. As soon as I think of a move, I do it; I sickle my feet like a motherfucker and bend my knees and flip forwards, backwards, I don't use my hands. With my ragged, jerky, unclean movements, the hairtie confining my thick pink hair in a sleek ponytail that I _hate_ slips off and my hair's loose, flipping around me in my face and my eyes and it feels _amazing_, like freedom, but not quite. And I'm spinning then, spinning even though it makes me sick and I'm _crying_ and I'm _exhausted…_

I hear a high, keening scream resounding off the thin walls in the studio, and it's only when I've collapsed onto the hardwood on my hands and knees that I realize the scream belongs to me.

Seconds pass, rolling by like centuries, as I stare at the floor with wide, wide eyes. The only sound in the room is my heaving, labored breathing, like I've just run a marathon. Ragged, pathetic breathing, the opposite of how I was taught, but I don't care. I can't, not when I'm pondering my own personal case of stolen identity. Who the hell _was_ that just now? Because that girl, that dynamo, who danced with her heart and forgot all of her training, that couldn't have been Sakura Haruno. Careful, controlled, poised, elegant Sakura Haruno with the perfect technique. That was somebody else. _This_ is somebody else, this girl with tears that won't _stop_ and a heaving chest and all the exhaustion in the world, just a fucking mess on the expensive hardwood, unable to look up at the mirror.

"You know, you're really very good," a smooth female voice says from behind me. I stiffen as her words echo off the high ceilings, the frigid mirror, the shallow walls, and _furious_ that someone's here to see this emotional disaster I'm trying to weave through.

"This is a closed practice," I grind out harshly through clenched teeth, still not looking up. I don't know who's behind me and I don't fucking care. I just want to be alone until I can compose myself into that charming, untouchable creature everybody thinks I am, wants me to be, resents me for.

"You're Sakura Haruno, aren't you," the woman continues like I haven't spoken, and I hear the clacking of high heels on the hardwood, the kind of heels that could ruin an expensive floor like this. She comes closer and closer and I finally snap, when I feel her hand on my shoulder.

I twist away from her like she's the Grim Reaper and I'm on my feet, rounding on her in a mess of pink hair and sweat and tears, and I open my mouth to tell her to _fuck off_ in every single language I know when…

My jaw drops.

"You're…you're…"

It's Tsunade. I can't believe it. The head instructor at Konoha College of the Arts. She's one of the greatest dancers who ever lived and an even better teacher, as beautiful as she is in all the books I've read about her, tall and commanding and forceful. Blonde hair and discerning amber eyes and I feel so messy, so unprepared, so unworthy of this moment.

"You're…oh my God, you're…"

"Well, don't turn into a stuttering mess on me _now,_" she says with a smirk of amusement on perfect painted lips. "It looked like you were about to call me something _really_ colorful."

Tsunade. I was just about to cuss out _Tsunade_ like the trashy girl I used to be (still am). She's a living legend, one of my role models, and I was about to tear her a new three-bedroom, two-bath doublewide asshole for invading my practice.

"I'm so sorry," I hear myself choke out, wiping away my tears with the back of my hand like she's gonna punch me for crying. "I…I didn't know…um, yeah, I'm Sakura Haruno. It's so nice to meet you." I jut out my tear-soaked hand for her to shake, then think better of it and snatch it back. Fiddle with my hair instead. Fix my ponytail.

"Calm down," she says, rolling her eyes. "I'm not going to hit you, I just wanted to see you dance. I've heard a lot about you."

"You have?" I gasp. "From...from Miss Suzume?" I knew Miss Suzume had contacts at KCA – she certainly bragged about them enough – but I didn't realize her influence went all the way up to _Tsunade._

"Your instructor? No. I don't accept solitations for students from anyone but my own staff. No, you've made a name for yourself all on your own."

"Oh," I say, shocked. The way Miss Suzume talks, it's as if she owns us and any successes we earn are technically hers. The idea that I might have done something right on my own never really occurred to me. "Well…um, thank you so much for saying that."

"I'm not blowing sunshine up your ass, I said it 'cuz it's true!" she barks at me roughly, with none of the poise or control you might expect from a ballerina of her caliber. I'm stunned, but it reminds me a little bit of myself. The fact that I could have something weird in common with someone like Tsunade? "I've seen videos of you before. Your routines. You've got good technique."

"Thank you so m-"

"It's not a compliment!" she snaps. "You're too wooden. Too rigid. There's no life in your eyes in those tapes I've seen of you. You're like a _robot._"

Ouch. Hit the nail on the head. My worst fear: that my lack of enthusiasm for dancing would show on my face. And perfect, that the director of the performing arts school I want to attend is the one who points it out.

"Then I come here to see if it's just on TV that you look like an automaton, and I see _this._ A fragile, emotional wretch of a girl with absolutely no technique to speak of…"

That's right, Tsunade. Drive the knife in a little deeper. KCA has never looked so far away. I'm literally watching all my dreams disintegrate in front of me.

"…dancing like she _loves it._"

I blink and look up at her.

"I don't know what that dance was just now," she tells me, her eyes boring relentlessly into mine like she's trying to figure me out. "It may have started off as ballet but it turned into something else really quick. You let go of yourself. You danced with your heart, from your heart. I read every emotion on your face and it was _captivating,_ young lady. So you tell me, which is it?"

"Um…ma'am?"

"They told me you were intelligent," Tsunade scoffs. "Geez. I asked _which one_ are _you?_ Are you the prima ballerina I've heard so much about, or are you this _much more interesting_ dancer who hasn't been given enough freedom to shine?"

"I…I don't _know._"

As I say the words, I realize how long I've held them in.

I don't _know_ if ballet is what I want anymore. It's damn sure nowhere near as fun as it used to be, and my passion for it was melting away little by little, sure, but I'd always just choked it back, those feelings. Chalked it up to performance anxiety and convinced myself everything was fine.

But I don't fucking know anymore if this is what I want. That's the truth. Ballet is…it's not what I was ready for. I don't know if it will ever be.

"You're graduating this spring, correct?" Tsunade asks me, smiling a little, like she's expected this horrible internal conflict I've been struggling with for three years now.

"Yes, ma'am," I murmur, staring down at the floor. Ashamed of my admission, to this _monster_ in the dance industry, that I've been living a lie, playing up a passion I'd lost long ago, going through the motions in a field that had given me nothing but strife and heartache and disappointment disguised as shiny gold trophies and crisp golden medals. And I just went and blew _any chance I had_ of getting into KCA in the first place.

"Then I'm going to give you my card," she says flatly, whipping a hand into her notorious bosom (they probably couldn't make a bra tight enough to restrain her famous tits, I realize spitefully, as my own ache to be released from their bindings). She plucks a business card with nothing on it but a phone number. "That's my cell phone number. Be advised I do not randomly distribute that to any girl with half an ounce of talent. I see a lot in you, Sakura, but I need you to see the same in yourself. I have no room in my school for anyone who lacks passion in what they do."

"Then…if you think I've got no passion for dance, then why are you giving me this card?" I demand, my voice losing any respect whatsoever. I'm angry now. Frustrated. She's waving my future in my face like a bone to a dog, only to snatch it away last second?

"Because I don't think you've got _no passion for dance,_" she tells me bluntly. "I think you've got _no passion for ballet._ Remember that there is a difference, Sakura."

My eyes widen.

"Why are you here in the first place?" she asks me, leaning back against the railing casually, like we're best friends. "I know you come from foster care, that there was no rich asshole in your family pushing you to do this like so many of the other students here. You're here because you worked for it, which means at one point, you must've loved it. Correct?"

I hesitate, then decide _fuck it,_ I'm gonna tell the truth. To her, and to myself. And if I fuck myself right out of the education I always wanted, at least I did it _honestly._

"I did," I admit. "I did love it. Ballet…it used to be a challenge. And there was something about it, something about moving, something about…about translating music into motion…there was nothing like it. It's like it just…it builds you up inside until you're so _full_ of something that it has to get out somehow, and it comes out in your legs, in your arms, in your whole body. Right from your heart. There's nothing like it in the world, and…

"And somewhere along the way…it stopped being fun. It stopped being exhilarating." I sit down on the floor as I try and process what I'm saying. Words are flying out of my mouth before I realize what they are, and who's hearing them. I'm such a fucking idiot, but now that I've started, I can't stop. "There was too much pressure. From everyone, everywhere. And mostly from myself. And I was in too deep for too long to try and get out of it now. What am I, without ballet?"

"A dancer," Tsunade says simply. "And a damn good one, Sakura. Giving up ballet to pursue other fields of dance isn't giving up on your dreams, at all. It's redefining them. It's sacrificing one thing in your life to pursue what is clearly and obviously your passion. You were _born_ to dance; who said it had to be in a tutu?"

I can't think of a word to say to that. I'm spent. Literally. All the adrenaline that rushed through me before, while I was dancing, while I was crying, while I was spitting out my life's story to _the_ Tsunade, has been thoroughly purged from my body and I feel like I could sleep for days.

Tsunade studies me before chuckling to herself, like she's seen it all before. She stands up off the railing and dusts herself off.

"Take some time to think on what I've told you," she tells me. "It's not about giving up who you are. It's about finding what lights you up from inside – what gives you that feeling you used to get – and what you _love doing._ I realize I've probably hit you with a lot just now, so do yourself a favor and think about this. Then, you give me a call. And we'll see about next year, for you."

An opportunity. Not a door closing in my face, but a window opening. Give up ballet. Take up dance. I could do more hiphop, more electronica, more acro…contemporary lyrical, with ballet influences but so many more, interesting, exciting moves I can add in, dancing from my heart like Tsunade said, so much more feeling, so much more _everything…_

"I'll think about it," I promise faintly. There are tears in my eyes again. "I…"

"Don't thank me yet," Tsunade warns. "Give me a call when you know what you want. And don't give that number to your snot-nosed instructor, either. I rejected her no-talent ass from my school twenty years ago, I don't need her spamming my inbox with solicitations."

I choke out a shocked laugh – I didn't know that about Miss Suzume – and take Tsunade's offered hand as she pulls me up to my feet.

"It…it was so good to meet you," I say, since she won't accept a thank you, and I'm a little bit too afraid of her to push her on it.

She smirks. "Don't I know it. See you later, kid."

And when she leaves the studio, heels clicking on the expensive floor, and I'm all alone again, I can't breathe around my excitement. In a rush of movement, I snatch my cell phone out of my duffel bag jammed in the corner, and scroll down to my newest saved contact. I've never called him before so I don't know if he'll pick up, but while I'm riding this high, I dial it anyway.

He answers on the third ring, tone as annoyed over the phone as it is in person. "What do you want."

"I…I'm a little too tired to come into work tonight," I tell him. "D'you want to…I don't know. Hang out, or something?"

A pause. "And do what."

"I don't know, it doesn't matter. Just…tell Kakashi I'm sorry, I need a little break. I'm gonna head back to my dorm and get pizza or something."

"_You_ want _pizza?_"

I'm too intoxicated on this conversation with my childhood idol to let Sasuke's shock irritate me.

"Yeah."

"You sound…different. Weird."

"Well if it's such a PROBLEM talking to me, then…"

"Shut up," he snaps. "Don't leave for your dorm yet. Where are you?"

"Where I always am, dummy. Don't pull this late-night-hero-walking-home-the-damsel-in-distress card with me, it's tired." But I'm a little bit giddy that he wants to, honestly. For reasons I refuse to examine in any significant detail. One major life-changing revelation at a time.

"I know where you are, smartass, I just meant which studio."

"Studio E," I tell him. "And hurry up. I haven't had pizza in _two years._ I don't think I can wait ten more minutes."

I hang up before he can call me 'annoying,' and I untie my ponytail. Shake my hair out over my shoulders, let it fall in a messy, tangled pile down my back; there's no more headache, no more pressure in my skull, and I'm breathless in anticipation of all these new _possibilities._ I've made no decisions, still have plenty to think about, but now knowing that this isn't the end-all, be-all for me, that there could be life after ballet if I really wanted it, loosens the pressure locked around my heart little by little. It's easier to breathe already.

First and foremost, though, is a night of pizza and movies with my newest friend.

Because maybe I don't know _exactly_ what I want to be when I grow up right now, but I know I don't ever want to be lonely, again.

* * *

**note..** hi, beautifuls! couple things. first off: i love you. that goes without saying. second: this story is about dance; specifically, ballet. i've been doing this shit since the age of three. that's nearly twenty years. and my experience is not necessarily typical, so don't go judging dancers or dance teachers based on what i personally have been through. not every really good ballerina is an anorexic headcase. and there are many, many, many wonderful, compassionate, understanding, patient teachers out there, but there are also ones like miss suzume. she's not an evil character, she just knows what's waiting out there in the big wide world of dance. it's one of the hardest industries in the world, and you have to have a real backbone to be any good at it. and oftentimes the most talented ones have it the worst, like sakura here. but yeah, i realize that someone might read this and think that i'm demonizing the dance world, and that's definitely not my intention. i love dance. but i do want to point out that it isn't as lovely as everyone thinks it is. there's a real dark, gutterbutt underbelly in there, too.

and thirdly, thank you all for respecting my no-concrit policy. i realize i'm in the minority on this site with not wanting to improve by anybody's standards but my own, but i really appreciate 99.99% of you understanding and not hating me for it. by no means do i think i'm the best writer in the world, i could list 100 things wrong with my writing right off the top of my head, but if i feel like i'm getting better by my own standards, then i'm happy. i just ask that if you don't like what i'm writing, to kindly move on, not try and fix it up yourself; devote your time to analyzing the other writers on this site who are looking for criticism to improve, there are millions of wonderful writers here.

also: i know there wasn't much sasuke/sakura interaction, but please don't hound me for it. i have to develop their friendship first, then their relationship. as tempting as it is to write down a hot hook-up scene in the studio, i have to restrain myself. FOR THE SAKE OF LITERATURE.

god i love you guys. i didn't think i'd be as into this whole fanfiction thing as i am now, but i'm addicted to all of you. (and it passes my night shifts at the bar pretty well, too.)

sorry to ramble. y'alls know i get talkative when i'm drunk. ;) let me know if you liked it!

xoxoxo Drunky :)


	8. Needles

I keep my head down as we walk from the practice studio to Sakura's dorm room across campus, tucked into the collar of my leather jacket (that still smells a little like brown sugar cinnamon, after I loaned it to her the other night). She doesn't really notice, with her hair down for once and a crazy look in her eyes, like she's just won the lottery but doesn't know who to tell first.

I'm heading to _Sakura Haruno's_ dorm room after 11 pm. I know for a fact every guy on campus – including and especially my moronic best friend – would kill to be in my shoes right now, and here I am like it's something to be ashamed of.

Not that I have any _intentions,_ hidden or otherwise, in hanging out with her. But I know what this looks like. The famous Sasuke Uchiha sneaking into an attractive girl's dorm after almost everyone else has gone to bed? I know what it looks like, and I know people would talk if they knew. And when you have almost no privacy anymore in your life, you value it all the more.

The walk is long and it's dark and it's cold, and I realize that Sakura does this all the time. Alone, late at night. It's frustrating. A smart girl like her should know better, but she doesn't. Or worse: she does, and doesn't care.

There's something…different about her. I can't really place it. Besides her hair loose for a change, out of that frustratingly perfect ponytail she has to wear all the time, there's something _off._ It's not a bad thing, but I notice it right away. Something in her walk. She still has that bizarre grace that only comes with years of grueling practice, but she's carrying herself differently, somehow. I can't place it.

"I'll order a pizza," she says, when she swipes us into her building and takes us up to her floor. We don't pass anybody in the hallways, which I'm glad for, and she unlocks her door and lets us both inside, then shuts it behind her. "Then I'm gonna grab a quick shower before it comes, I'm so grimy. Make yourself at home," she adds, with a sweet little smile. Then she grabs a towel and a shower caddy and disappears into the adjoining bathroom like it's the most natural thing in the world for a guy she barely knows to be left to his own devices in her room.

It's awkward, being alone in here. Sakura and I are friends, sure (at least, I think that's what we kind of decided on) but it's still uncomfortable being in a place that reeks so much of her that I'm almost choking on it. But here in the place that's most sacred to her, the only place she has to let her hair down, so to speak, there's so much revealed to me about who she _really_ is that I'm instantly intoxicated.

I hear the shower start in the bathroom after she's ordered our pizza, and I take a look around from my stiff seat on her bed. I see pictures on her nightstand and all over the utilitarian white walls, pictures of herself and other people, many of them featuring a girl with blonde hair I've seen around campus a few times here and there. Probably her best friend. A very old one sits in a little black frame on her bedside table, one with a pink-haired toddler cradled in the arms of a young couple. Presumably her parents.

I frown at the picture, because that's the only one with her parents in it; the rest of the pictures feature a growing pink-haired girl among different families, families who look nothing like her.

I come to the hazy conclusion that Sakura's a foster child. And that's weird to me, that she didn't bring it up. But once I think it over, it's not _that_ weird. I don't know her very well yet, and she doesn't know me very well, either. Plus it's not like foster kids walk around with numbers tattooed on their wrists to let you know who they are. It probably isn't a big deal to her anymore.

But it's a new fact I learn about her, along with her love of rotten boy bands and classic movies, judging by the posters on her walls; she's surprisingly messy for someone who dances during the day and scrubs floors at night, with clothes strewn all over the floor and on top of a very full hamper. She probably doesn't have much free time to do the laundry. I can relate; my own hamper's overflowing in my dorm on the other side of campus. There are thick, heavy, old books in her bookcase, well-worn and well-read. Surprising authors, too. Austen, Joyce, Tolstoy; I wonder how she's got time to cram in fine literature around everything else on her plate.

Her favorite color doesn't seem to be pink, which is weird. It looks like it's blue, judging by the blue bedspread I'm sitting on emblazoned with lighter blue clouds, and there are rainbow-colored pillows at the head of her bed and she's draped a bunch of multicolored ribbons and sashes from the ceiling in girly designs. The neon green area rug at the foot of her bed and the bright purple curtains over her windows clash horribly, and I realize that Sakura Haruno might be the most colorful person I've ever met.

_Tch._ I scoff at my own thoughts, and glare at nothing in particular. I'm stuck here now, with this colorful girl I barely know but somehow understand, waiting for her to get out of the shower (I keep my mind out of the gutter, but Sakura's hot, so it's hard) so we can eat pizza together and make awkward conversation. And refusing her, at the time, wasn't even an option. And that's annoying to me, how all my choices stop being my own whenever she comes into play.

She makes me do things, think things, feel things I wouldn't ever normally consider, and I don't realize I'm doing, thinking, and feeling those things until they've already happened. And I can't figure out why, and I don't really want to. Because I can already see where things might go if I opened that door, and I don't plan on giving Sakura Haruno anymore power than she's already stolen for herself.

We're friends. That's _it._

Sakura beats the delivery guy. She slips out of the shower in a fluffy robe with her hair damp and her face clean of sweat and makeup. She looks much smaller than usual, drowning in the terrycloth with her slender legs bare, none of the dancer's regality she's expected to carry reflected in this dressed-down teenage girl she's not supposed to be.

It's less clothes than a girl _should_ be wearing around a guy she barely knows, but Sakura doesn't seem to notice. Instead she comes back into her room in a cloud of steam from a hot shower, exhaling a heavy sigh of relief.

"Thanks for waiting," she tells me with a comfortable smile. She doesn't look the least bit awkward around me as I feel around her, which is even more annoying. It would be decent of her to feel at least a little out of sorts.

"Didn't have much choice," I sneer at her. She rolls her eyes.

"Oh, whatever, you had nothing better to do, anyway. Just turn around a second so I can get dressed."

I obey, and I'll admit this to _no one, _ever, but part of me doesn't want to. I'm a guy. Just because I haven't yet acted on my urges doesn't mean they're not there. And Sakura, for as frustrating and confusing and annoying as she is, is extremely beautiful. I wouldn't mind seeing her, seeing if the reality compares to the fantasy, if she's worth all the hype…

I screw my eyes shut picturing what she must look like under those tight practice leggings, those loose-fitting sweatshirts. I can't _believe_ of all times _now_ my hormones decide to make a grand appearance, but now that I've started thinking about her, I can't stop. It's not my fault. She's fucking hot and it's not my _fault,_ but I can't _not_ imagine that beautiful skin of hers, in areas I haven't seen…

"Okay, all done," she says cheerfully, unaware of the seeds she just planted inside me. I glare at her, pissed that she's doing all this unnatural shit to me _by accident,_ and see that she's tugged on a tank top and a pair of sweatpants that are too big for her so she has to roll up the legs. My arousal cools, but only slightly. Maybe it's all that dance, but the way she moves is too seductive for her – or my – own good.

"I got pepperoni," she tells me, hopping up onto her bed beside me. She keeps a respectful distance, one that I really, suddenly, feel like disrespecting. I'm not only hanging out with a smoking hot girl in the middle of the night, I'm sharing a _bed_ with her. The implications of all of this are not lost on me, but Sakura remains blissfully oblivious to all of it. "You like pepperoni? Well I don't care, I haven't had pizza in _years._"

"Why not," I ask, but I already know.

"Ballet," she replies predictably.

"Then why are you eating it now."

"Because I'm celebrating."

But that's all she'll say, because the delivery guy gets here finally and she hops up to get the pizza.

* * *

"Stupid movie," I scoff when it's over.

"Oh, come on!" she argues. "It's a _universally_-accepted excellent movie and you know it. You're just being a contrarian. You just want to have something to not like so you look like the smartest guy in the room."

"It's a pandering 80's mess of a movie with shit actors that's supposed to be some kind of allegory to teenage life," I inform her nastily.

"It _is_ an allegory to teenage life!" she snaps, shutting the lid of her laptop to yell at me more conveniently. Laying down side by side feels like the most natural thing in the world, but I don't address it and neither does she. "It's about realizing that appearances can be deceiving."

"Appearances _are not_ deceiving," I sneer. "I can take one look at anybody and know everything I need to know about them."

"Oh, really?" Sakura's balmy green eyes light up with a challenge, and she sits up to glare at me. "Then what can you figure out about _me?_"

I look at her like she's asking me to. I take in the pizza sauce smeared on her cheek she doesn't know about. I take in the damp curly mess of hair and the way her skin's pale, like she never sees any sunlight. Way too pretty for her own good.

"That you're a fucking mess," I tell her flatly.

I expect her to get real fucking offended by that. You don't just tell a girl – especially one like Sakura, the overachieving, Type A personality who strives for that absurd illusion of perfection – that she's a fucking mess. Not without her flipping the fuck out.

But Sakura proves that she's nowhere near as delicate as she appears, because she throws her head back and _laughs._

We could be friends, I guess, settling back down on her pillows while she puts away The Breakfast Club and grabs another movie to watch on her laptop.

I think we already are.

* * *

"How are you, Sasuke?"

My brother's voice on the phone is calm, relaxed. Sober, for once. He sounds old, though. Old and tired and sick of everything.

"Fine," I tell him. And it's not really a lie, for once.

"How have you been doing? With your music and all?"

"Fine," I tell him. And that IS a lie. It's getting harder and harder for me to think up rhythms the way I used to. And lyrics? Fucking forget it. I pick up my guitar a hundred times a day and lose a little more motivation each and every time.

"You know, you're really a terrible liar," Itachi chuckles.

"It's going _fine,_" I insist, glaring at the stupid guitar in question, propped up in the corner of my bedroom. "What about you. Out on the road, and shit."

"I've been well. We did a show in Ame last night. A few press junkets today, nothing major. Caught up with my ex-girlfriend, too."

"Which one?" I quip dryly. Itachi's been linked to more women than he or I could count.

"The only one that ever mattered," he sighs, sounding old and tired again. "Hana."

I remember her. Kiba's older sister; she and Itachi dated back when they attended KPAA a few years ago. She played cello, I think. Something with strings. Itachi broke it off when he went on the road.

"What was she doing out in Ame?"

"A concert, with her orchestra."

"Some coincidence."

"Never should've left her," Itachi tells me wistfully, and it's even weirder since I can tell he's sober. "You end up regretting things like that. Selling your soul to this business…they never really tell you what you'll have to give up to really achieve your dreams. The best you can do is be sure that you're doing what you love."

Sometimes, I really fucking resent Itachi. The way he can be a thousand miles away but say something that pinpoints exactly what I'm thinking or feeling, like he's fucking omniscient or something. I think about this amazing future I'm gonna have in music, but how I don't want it, at all. I think about tattooing, and how much I love it. I think about fucking _Sakura,_ my newest friend and the only girl I can stand to be around, even considering what a shitshow she is. And how the hell can Itachi know about all of this?

"When you find a girl like Hana," Itachi goes on, like some lovesick fucking sap, "one that you regret leaving, one that…anchors you to yourself, one you can laugh with…before all the fucking fame and the revelry and the carrying on, one you can _really_ be yourself around…"

"I'm not gonna find a girl like that, Itachi," I say, pinching the bridge of my nose. "Listen, I gotta go."

"Work?"

"Aa."

"All right. Take care, little brother."

"Hn. You, too."

* * *

"Talked to my sister today," Kiba says at work that night. He's sketching this really badass tiger for a client, sitting on the couch Sakura sleeps on at least three nights a week.

"Aa," I reply, focusing on my 9 rounded bugpin mags. Usually I use the 14 rounds but I've been switching up my style lately, trying to improve.

"Said she hung out with your brother last night. They datin' again?"

"I don't think so."

"Good."

I look up from my needles and narrow my eyes. "What's that supposed to mean?"

Kiba meets my gaze without a flinch. "That your brother broke my sister's heart like a dick when they broke up, and I ain't so keen to give him a second chance at it."

Logically, I know that Kiba's just looking out for his sister; I know I'd hate anybody who hurt my brother, just on principle. I get where he's coming from. But nobody knows Itachi like I know him, nobody knows how everything weighs on him. How much he misses Hana, how much he hates himself for what happened between them. And I've always been a little irrational when it comes to my brother. He's all I got.

"Whatever," I mutter, returning my attention to the needles I'm about to use on my next client. "That's between them. I don't care."

Kiba lets it go. Neither of us talk about it – or anything else – for the rest of the shift. When Sakura comes in for her cleaning shift, he says goodbye to her and not me, and when she asks me what the hell that's about, I don't even know where to start to explain.

* * *

**note..** can i just say something. i said a million times i'd finish all my goddamn stories and i meant it. when i do that is my business. till then, i'll work on what i feel like working on and i'll update at my own pace, no one else's. it AMAZES me how demanding people can get on here.

ugh. sorry, y'all. just fucking frustrated. THIS IS A HOBBY FOR ME. i don't do it for anyone but myself. and i love and adore you guys, and i hopehopehope you enjoy reading these stories as much as i enjoy writing them. but pleasepleaseplease be patient with me. it makes me feel really unappreciated when you harass me about updating.

now that THAT'S out of the way...i like itachi and hana together. i also like watching the departed three times in a weekend. and i love the 99% of you on here who are loyal, wonderful, appreciative, beautiful readers. :)

what'd you think?

xoxo daisy :)


	9. Balançoire

Maybe you don't know this about me, but I'm a classic overthinker.

It goes along with the whole self-absorbed, neurotic perfectionist thing that's slowly but surely sapping me of any semblance of personality since I signed onto this ballet program a few years ago. It might be one of the best and worst things about me, how I analyze every single thing to _death_ until something that seemed so outlandishly, crazily perfect suddenly has a million holes in it.

It's after Sasuke's gone back to his room for the night (it's really, really late and I kind of feel bad that he's got to walk all the way across campus) and I lay back down on my bed (and my sheets smell kind of like him, like tobacco and mint) and that's when this whole thing with Tsunade blows up in my face.

She wants me to quit ballet.

Me.

_Me._

It sounded so _good_ at the time. You know? Just, just give it all up, turn my back on it for good. No more stress. No more pressure. No more catty, two-faced girls waiting for me to trip up, no horrendous obsession with food, no more nasty ass teacher screaming at me how I'm not good enough. What a refreshing idea. What a _beautiful_ idea.

But.

I worked so hard to get here. Didn't I? I worked my ass off to get where I am. I got a scholarship. I trained and conditioned and practiced and performed, I've got the best goddamn win record in the company, I'm being groomed for greatness and here I'm even _thinking_ about putting it all behind me?

When I'm so close?

Just a few more months, I tell myself, unconsciously snuggling deeper into my covers and Sasuke's faint scent. Just a few more months of this and I'll graduate and then…

And then what?

It kills me, man. It fucking kills me that I just don't know anymore. I don't know what to think of Tsunade's offer. It sounds like a betrayal of myself and my craft and everything everybody's been working so hard at for me to have this fucking opportunity. And that I'm even _considering_ throwing it all away for _any_ reason, I just don't fucking know myself anymore.

Why can't every night be like tonight was? Bailing on all my responsibilities, calling off work, eating pizza and watching movies with someone I don't need to try to impress? There was something so…_liberating_ about letting my hair down tonight, about arguing The Breakfast Club and plucking a pepperoni off a piece of pizza without worrying about how it's gonna affect my skin or my waistline in the morning.

It's a little too quiet now that Sasuke's gone back to his room. I don't much like the quiet. Everyone assumes I do since I'm on my own a lot, but I don't like the loneliness, you know? I don't like feeling like, even in a school as big as this one and a dorm as huge as the one I'm staying in with like fifty other people, that I'm just…alone.

I don't think I'd feel this way, if I took up Tsunade on her offer. I don't know how I know that, but….

I don't know. Can I really just…do this? Or should I stick it out with ballet and…

Hope it gets better?

I fall asleep with Tsunade's wrinkled calling card in my hand and a thousand other questions rolling through my brain and no. Fucking. _Answers._

* * *

By sheer coincidence (I swear I'm not stalking him, if anything, he's stalking me) Sasuke and Kiba and a few other guys are playing a show at the coffeehouse Ino and I are at Saturday night. I have a rare night off (no work, and no performances on a Sunday) so I let her talk me into going out for tiramisu. I'm surprised to see him performing in public; I almost never hear him play, even when we're hanging out at the tattoo shop. He almost never brings up the fact that he even _plays_ guitar, so I kind of learned along the way not to bring it up. So seeing it happen, him sitting casually on a stool with his busted-up guitar in his hands is a surprise, even if it shouldn't be. This is what he goes to KPAA for, right? Performing arts. Music. Guitar.

I guess I kind of see him as a tattoo artist instead.

"You didn't tell me _Sasuke's_ band was playing here tonight," Ino says with a wink in my direction as we take a seat at a two-person table near the front of the shop.

"I didn't know," I reply honestly, and Sasuke chooses that moment to look up from his guitar playing, meet my eyes, and smirk. The sudden heat that steals across my face is only because the shop is overcrowded and I'm a bit overdressed; I wave a little from over my coffee and smile back at him.

"Oh God you two are _sickening,_" Ino sneers, smoothing back her nonexistent blonde flyaways and making eyes at Sasuke's keyboardist. "Why don't you just bang and get it over with, I'm choking on the sexual tension."

"Ino!" I hiss, mortified as I look around to see if anyone heard my loudmouth best friend spouting off gossip garbage, but we're a little hard to overhear with how packed the shop is. "Jesus, keep your voice down! Nothing is going on between me and Sasuke, we're just friends, that's _it,_"

"Oh _whatever._ Like Sasuke Uchiha ever hangs out with any girls at random."

"You're really overthinking this shit and I'll kill you if you tell anybody your stupidass theory," I growl, returning my attention to my cake and to Sasuke's band.

He doesn't sing or anything, he's not even headlining. Looks like their lead singer is a guy with a ponytail and this really raspy, almost lazy voice, and the blonde guy on drums sings backup. Sasuke's as quiet as he always is, but his guitar playing is amazing. His fingers are quick on the frets and he drives the music where he needs to and backs off when it's someone else's turn. He's really good. All the girls in the coffee shop think so anyways.

I don't know, though. To me, it just looks like he's kind of…going through the motions. Like he's good, and he knows it, but he's not really all that into it.

I giggle a little into my coffee.

There's a lot of that going around, I realize, with more than a touch of fatalism and just the faintest hint of irony.

It's kind of nice just being out on the town, for once. (Even if it sounds fucking pathetic, that an hour at a coffeeshop is my idea of living large, but it is, truly.) I get to dress up and do my makeup the way I want to do it, instead of how I'm told. I get to shake some scrunching mousse into my hair and make it a wild curly mess instead of pin-straight and perfect. I get to wear a sweater dress and tights instead of practice clothes and I know that I won't have to get up at the crack of dawn first thing in the morning.

And Sasuke's band is pretty good, and the environment is nice and warm, it smells like coffee and everybody's having a good time. I feel myself relaxing little by little, breathing a bit easier and laughing with Ino and the other people around us. Clapping for Sasuke's funny drummer and calling out requests. It's a good time.

"We're gonna take a break," the lead singer says with a yawn. "Be back in a minute."

Sasuke removes his guitar from around his neck and sets it on the floor next to his stool before sliding to the stage. He's swarmed almost _instantly_ by a gaggle of girls we go to school with and a few townies, and I giggle at the look of irritation on his face. Sasuke might be my newest friend, but I certainly know him well enough to see that he's not one to enjoy being fondled and harassed.

To spare him any aggravation, I take pity on the poor creature and shout out, "Hey, Sasuke! Come here a sec!"

He rolls his eyes, but he disentangles himself from his adoring fans and joins us at our table. "What do you want?"

"Figured you might need a break from the horde of estrogen. This is my best friend Ino. Ino this is Sasuke."

"Nice to meet you," Ino says as they shake hands, a winning smile on her face.

"Why do you _always_ get the best-looking chicks, asshole?" another voice chimes in, and the blonde drummer wraps his arm around Sasuke's shoulders, sweaty from his drumming and grinning ear to whiskered ear. "Hey, girls, I'm Naruto, Naruto Uzumaki!"

"Stupid," Sasuke mutters, shrugging Naruto off his shoulder. "That's Sakura," he says, jutting his chin out at me. "And her friend Ino." A thumb in Ino's direction.

"Liked your set, Naruto," Ino says, always so comfortable talking to strangers in a way I can't be. She leans back in her chair, stirring her half-empty latte with a straw. "You guys play here a lot?"

Naruto shoves Sasuke to make room for himself at our table. Sasuke's leg rubs up against mine on accident and I'm wearing nylons, so it's easy to feel the rough scrape of his jeans on my knee. I don't know why, but I blush like crazy. And Sasuke sits there smooth as ever, doesn't look up, just orders a coffee from a starry-eyed waitress.

"Few times a month," Naruto says. "You guys are dancers, right?"

"I do hiphop," Ino replies. "And she does ballet. But you know that already, everybody does." She says it with a roll of her eyes, bored with it, like it's all anybody knows about me.

In a way, it's kind of true.

"Yeah, guess so!" Naruto laughs, scratching the back of his head. "Hey, come over here, you guys!" he calls back to the other members of his band chilling out at the counter. They join us at our table which is suddenly the fullest in the house.

"Hey, Sakura, looking good!" Kiba says to me with a grin.

"Hey, Kiba, how are you?" I reply, smiling back and blushing. It's kind of nice when a cute guy tells you you're attractive; I'm almost never around cute guys anymore, with one broody exception, who snorts beside me.

Introductions are made – we meet Shikamaru, the singer, and Neji, the keyboardist, and of course Sasuke, Naruto, and Kiba. They all seem like really cool people, and even if I barely know them, soon we're all talking and laughing like we've known each other for years. And it's really, really nice, just hanging out with people.

"So you girls got any plans tonight?" Kiba asks after awhile.

"Not after this, no," Ino replies wistfully. "My boyfriend Sai's at an art convention out in Kusa. We were just gonna head back to our dorms and watch TV or something." She meets my eye from across the table and winks, like she's planning something.

"Oh, awesome!" Naruto exclaims. "There's a basement party over in the union building, when we're done here, why don't you guys come with?"

I raise my eyebrows in amusement at Sasuke, who shoots Naruto a filthy glare. He's not exactly thrilled with the plan, clearly, but to my surprise, he doesn't say anything to shoot it down, which is tacit permission, I guess. Instead he rolls his eyes at me like it's all been done before and stuffs his hands into the pockets of his leather jacket.

"I'll go," I hear myself say, and I'm a little bit shocked at how readily I agree. Normally, when someone invites me somewhere, I have a ready-made excuse: 'Sorry I can't, I've got practice.' 'Sorry I can't, I have a performance.' 'Sorry I can't, I need to study. Maybe next time!' But something's gotten into me lately and I find myself wanting to go out and do more. Try new things. Make new friends and have a good time, for once. "We can do that. Right, Ino?"

She grins at me, a grin of pride and excitement, since I'm usually such a wet blanket about going out. "Sure we can," she says easily.

And just like that, I make three new friends.

* * *

Everyone at KPAA is underage, so we're not allowed to drink. And the parties we have are usually school-sanctioned so it's not like everyone can just roll in with a handle of vodka and a mixer.

Still, students find a way. You're not gonna stop high school kids from getting into the liquor cabinet, even if our high school's not normal by anyone's standards. Teachers kind of look the other way, for the most part, and once we get inside the basement at the union, it smells like booze.

This probably won't surprise you, but I'm not a drinker. I'm not much of a party girl, honestly. I never had the time, and because I never had the time, I never gave myself the luxury of desire. I'm a little wary around alcohol to be honest, a little skittish. Alcohol makes friendly guys a little too friendly, and after dealing with it from Zaku and a bunch of assholes like him, I prefer my body unfondled. Not that everyone who drinks is a fondler, but…

But whatever. I'm sheltered, I know it.

I feel like Sasuke gets that, though, because he sticks kind of close to me tonight. It's real casual. No one could look at us and assume we came together, or that we're dating or anything. He just orients himself so he's near to me without smothering me, laid back but ready for anything. It's literally impossible not to feel safe around Sasuke, asshole that he is.

The music is deafeningly loud. Another school band is playing. At KPAA there's no shortage of performers, and yeah, the whole screamo thing isn't really up my alley – not when I'm stuck listening to Bach and Beethoven on loop – and it's really loud, but it's fun all the same, being a part of all this craziness, instead of constantly above it.

Like if you don't know me as well as Ino or Sasuke, you'd never know I'm a ballerina, the way I am right now. Just another girl in the crowd, laughing and bobbing my head tunelessly to the music, wild-haired and wild-eyed and no restraints. No poise or grace or control or anything that makes Sakura Haruno who she is. I'm someone else entirely, and it feels _good._

Like I'm climbing my way out of loneliness one rung at a time.

"This doesn't seem like your scene!" I yell over the roar of the music and the crowd at Sasuke, who leans in closer to hear me.

"Doesn't seem like yours, either," he rumbles back in his deep, throaty voice. He smells really good, that mint and cigarette smell I like so much, even though I've never seen him chew gum or smoke. And when he's this close, it's hard to tune out how just _handsome_ he is. All angles and dark hair and dark eyes. Muscular, too. The good kind of muscular, lean and hard and…

I freeze, eyes wide as I realize where my thoughts are going. _What am I thinking?!_

It's just the atmosphere, I tell myself. Sasuke brushes up against me as we're jostled by the other students here screaming along to the band onstage in the basement, and with all tonight's excitement and how jittery I am from three mocha lattes, that must be why I'm thinking all this crazy shit about _Sasuke,_ of all people.

As if he needs one more panting, doe-eyed fangirl fawning over him.

We spend a little time there listening to the music. Ino really hits it off with Naruto (I wonder if she remembers her 'much-adored boyfriend' Sai, but before I can do the girl intervention, she yells at me to get Sasuke to walk me back to my dorm and vanishes with Naruto.)

(Oh, and she couldn't be more transparent.)

Sasuke takes my elbow as both of our best friends disappear into the crowd. I get the sense that he's had enough of all this, and I think I have, too. Like yeah, it's fun and everything, but the screamo music is getting repetitive and I can't hear anything for shit.

"You ready to go?" I shout over the noise.

"Aa," he replies, and he doesn't need to scream like an asshole to be heard, which is irritating. It doesn't feel like Sasuke's touched by anything that affects normal people. Like he has his own set of rules. "C'mon, I'll walk you back."

Normally I'd blow off such an offer – I _can_ take care of myself, contrary to popular belief; like, don't let the ballet slippers fool you, I'm from the hood – but for reasons I don't care to obsess over, I'm finding it somewhat…I don't know. _Pleasant_ spending time with Sasuke.

So I settle for a little roll of my eyes as we head up the stairs out of the crowded, sweaty basement.

It's really cold, almost Christmas, and the sudden chill hits me in the face like a hammer. I shiver a little and bury my hands in the pockets of my coat, wishing I'd worn something a bit more practical than nylons in December.

Sasuke notices, too.

"Stupid," he scoffs, quickening his pace so we get home faster. "It's cold as shit out here and you wear something see-through."

"Oh, whatever, Sasuke, I wouldn't expect someone like you to understand fashion," I sniff. "Beauty is pain."

Ballet is pain.

Fucking _life_ is pain. I think about Tsunade's offer again as we pass by the ballet studio; it's never felt further away, and I realize what I'm doing. Slowly, systematically, I'm closing myself off to Tsunade's opportunity. I'm resettling myself into what I know best: sacrifice, discipline, and ballet.

Tsunade's offer was just a pipe dream, I tell myself. Something to think about with a smile, then tuck away because it's not ballet, therefore it's not a possibility. Doesn't matter. Like being offered the chance to star in a movie while you're in medical school. Really great, but just not gonna happen.

Sasuke's aware that there are tears in my eyes before I am.

"What are you crying for?" he demands. "You cry too much. Knock it off."

"Your compassion knows no bounds," I snap back, even though he's clearly uncomfortable with any displays of emotion. I rub my eyes with the back of my hand, scratchy gloves smearing carefully-applied makeup. "I'm just a little stressed, okay?"

"Didn't seem stressed the other night," he reminds me, and I think back to that night I played hooky with Sasuke and we hung out and had fun. No stress, no pressure. Tsunade had just given me her card and I was feeling all kinds of optimistic about my future.

I weigh my options. Is there any harm in bouncing what I'm feeling off an objective outsider? Usually I keep this shit to myself, let it marinate in my head until it manifests as something scary, like maybe an ulcer somewhere down the road. Or a tumor. But whatever. Maybe Sasuke'll make a good soundboard.

"Okay you know how I do ballet, right?" I say, and it sounds unbelievably lame. That's all _anybody_ knows about me.

"Aa."

"Well it's just…it's really hard lately. Not like, that I can't do it, just that it's getting harder and harder to _want_ to do it. You know what I mean?"

He says nothing in response as we walk towards my dorm, so I keep going.

"I used to _love_ it. It used to be something that made me happy. I used to think of my ballet studio as home. I'd go there all the time, before _and_ after practice, practice what I learned, try some new things. There was just nothing like it in the world, and…I don't know. Lately it's not fun anymore. It's just nothing but stress and the other day I was in the studio blowing off some steam and I was really frustrated with everything, and out of nowhere Tsunade comes in."

"Who?"

I sigh; stupid musicians not knowing about the best dancer in the _universe._ "She's the dean over at KCA. Maybe the best dance teacher in the world. Anyway, she saw me dancing – and I wasn't doing ballet at the time. To be honest I'm not really sure _what_ I was doing, I just kind of…let go. You ever just let go? But she saw it and was impressed with me. Said that she'd seen my ballet tapes and that I look like a robot but when I broke away from ballet, she thought I had passion, not just technique. She wants me to call her if I'm interested in taking lessons from her, but the kicker is she doesn't want me in her ballet program."

"You're supposed to be really good, though."

"She says she doesn't want anyone in her school to lack passion for what they do."

"So you're not sure if you want to stick it out with ballet or quit so you can take lessons from Tsunade."

"I'm just so confused, Sasuke. And it sucks. I thought I knew what I wanted, you know? I had a goal and a dream and I did everything I could to make it happen, but now I'm so close to graduating and I don't feel like I'm doing what's right for me. I feel like I'm…I'm letting myself be pulled down this path because it's what everyone expects of me, and I've forgotten what I expect from myself."

Sasuke releases a humorless chuckle, and when I look up at him, his eyes are far away, like he's reliving a hundred memories I wasn't around for. The feeling that he understands what I'm going through has never been stronger at this point.

"So what do you think I should do?" I whisper, cautiously. I don't know why his opinion means so much to me, but it does.

"I think you should do what makes you happy," he says flatly. "And fuck what everyone else has to say."

Such a nice, honest statement. A clear answer. Too bad I don't buy a _word_ of it.

Abruptly, irrationally, I'm angry. Because what Sasuke's saying is the exact opposite of what he's doing. And even if I'm becoming one myself, the last thing I need is a _hypocrite._

"If that's what you feel," I say a little coldly, "then why are you still playing guitar? It's obvious you don't even like it anymore."

He bristles, irritated by my bold statement, and stops walking. I stop, too, and I tense because it looks like he's gearing up for a fight. And I'm not good at confrontation, but confrontation doesn't typically wait until you're prepared for it.

"What's that supposed to mean?" he demands.

Oh, to hell with it.

"You play like you're being forced to," I snap. "You go to classes like it's the worst thing in the world and even at your gig tonight, you looked so _bored._ Like someone had a gun to your head and was making you do this when it's _clear_ that your tattooing is your passion. And it should be, you're amazing at it. I don't see you working on new rhythms or beats or whatever at Kakashi's after hours, you're always working on a new design. So if you think life's about following your passion, why the hell are you still _here?_" I wave around at the sprawling Konoha Performing Arts Academy campus, the jewel of performing arts schools in the country, and how Sasuke just doesn't seem to want it the way the rest of us do.

Sasuke's never looked angrier. At least, not that I've seen him. He's always been really calm and collected, but I get the impression that he's the kind of person who's capable of intense, intimidating fury. I'm not afraid of him, but I'm wondering if I stepped over the line. It looks like I not only _pressed_ Sasuke's hot button, I _smashed_ it.

He's shaking, but it has nothing to do with the cold. His black eyes are tinged almost red in his anger, and when he speaks, his voice isn't the even, relaxed baritone I'm accustomed to. It's low, very quiet, almost _dangerous._

There's a tightening in my stomach I can't explain.

"You think it's _easy?_" he murmurs softly, and I get the feeling a baby gazelle gets before it's ripped apart by a lion. Like I'm being lulled into a false sense of security with his volume, until he turns around and tears my head off with his words. "Doing what I do. Being who I am. You think it's _easy?_"

"I _know_ it's not," I retort boldly. I know, because he and I are a lot alike. That's why I want his opinion and, bizarrely, why his answer is annoying to me. Because it's what I want to hear, but it's coming from someone who doesn't trust in it himself, so how am I supposed to?

"Fuckin right it's not," he growls, and we're about two inches apart now. He leans in close to my face, his eyes narrowed as he regards me like I'm the most suspicious thing in his life. The tightening in my stomach spreads to my thighs as I become hyperaware of his amazing scent. The cut of his jaw. The slope of his shoulder. "You know who my brother is, don't you?"

"Yeah. So?"

"And it doesn't impress you, huh?" he whispers, his gaze flickering to my mouth and I don't know why that is, before returning to my eyes. "He's famous, isn't he? Rich and famous. That's not impressive to you?"

"Should it be?" I counter. "I don't know him, I know _you._"

"Well not everybody thinks the same way as you do," he breathes in my ear, and I feel my heartbeat pick up. I can't move, I can barely _think._ This close proximity is killing me and I still feel like he's gonna tear my throat out or something. He's so _angry._ "Growing up, this is all I had. I wanted to play guitar. Be in a band. Be as good as my brother. Be _better._ And it's working; I'm already better than he is."

He says it without a trace of his trademark arrogance. Just like it's a fact, and an ironic one at that.

"But you're _right,_ Sakura." He murmurs my name almost like a cussword, and I don't know why, I swear I don't, but part of me _thrills_ at it. "This isn't what I love doing. It hasn't been, not for _years._"

"So…so why don't you quit?" I ask him, my voice squeaky with nerves, because if he turns his face just two centimeters to the right, we'll be kissing.

"Why don't _you?_" he shoots back.

And here we are. An impasse. When an unstoppable force meets an immovable object. Two peas in a pod, and a whole host of other useless cliches that don't really apply to us, but at the same time, horrifyingly _do._

I'm a hypocrite, and so is he. And we're both aware of it, and we both know what we can do to stop it, but none of it matters. Knowing what will save us, and actively avoiding it. Plowing forward with our childhood dreams because that's what expected of us, and who will we be, if we turn our backs on who we were?

He's still so close. He breathes in like he's inhaling me and I close my eyes, irrational for the moment and wanting nothing more than to absorb his almost feral heat. So close. And then he draws back and I look up at him and there's something _beyond_ dangerous on his face. A smirk, self-deprecating and all-knowing.

"We already _found_ our passions," he informs me softly. I'm aware, slowly at first, that his fingers are playing with the kinks and curls in my hair, and it feels like nothing else in the world. "It's dance for you. It's art for me. So I can tell you to quit ballet and call Tsunade, and you can tell me to drop out of KPAA and start fulltime at Ink and Iron. But in the end, you and I both know these chains of ours are here to _stay._"

Being here, in the cold, with Sasuke, as he recites truths I never even realized I knew until he says them, is just like being in the studio the other day, before Tsunade came. It feels just as scary, just as liberating, just as _exhilarating_ as it did when I danced like an animal, when I let go of everything. Sasuke's got that way about him, he really does. I can't explain it. There's something about him that makes something fiery inside me, like nothing else ever could, except dance.

I'm intimidated by this connection to him. Scared of it. As scared as I was of myself, when I was screaming and crying and cussing and dancing with my fucking _heart._ I don't know _why_ I feel like this, but he's just so close, and he's so warm, and he's so broken, and he _understands._ The good, the bad, the ugly, the grotesque, he gets it because he's the same way I am.

He knows I'm not quitting ballet. I know he's not dropping out of the music program.

So tragic, so fucked _up._ And scary, in a good way.

For the first time, I want him to kiss me. I want to feel him. I want to connect to him physically since we're already right there psychologically. And once I recognize this disturbing connection as _desire,_ suddenly it's all I'm capable of feeling. My angst about school, all the pressures of my life and being me, all of it goes up in smoke and all of a sudden, my singular thought and emotion is wild, unabandoned, reckless desire for Sasuke Uchiha.

And this must be what passion feels like, outside of a dance studio.

* * *

**note..** some sasusaku progress, yafeelme? :) getting there, slowly but surely. dealing with sakura's confusion about her direction in life; next chapter will be more about sasuke's.

let me know if you liked it!

xoxo daisy


	10. Tribal

It's got bad news written all over it.

It's like someone lit a fire inside me and now I'm choking on fumes. I can't remember how my fingers ended up in her hair or when or why, but it's soft and unusually curly, falling all around her in kinks and waves, and she's _beautiful_ with her eyes dark and she _gets me,_ unbelievably, and I fucking want her.

It's been coming on awhile, I guess. If I'm being honest with myself. Pretty much since the night she screamed up a storm at the tattoo shop, baring her soul to me and showing me all the shit we had in common. And it was easier to ignore sometimes, impossible at others, and all of it with this total _inevitability_ that's led to this point. With me pissed off at her and obsessed with her and on some incomprehensible plane of mutual understanding in the middle of the night, just outside her dorm.

Bad news. She's bad for me, so fucking _bad._ Stressed-out, neurotic, anorexic, Type A whackjob with pretty eyes and skin I want to mark with something more permanent than needles and ink. I want her. I want to make her _mine._ It's startling and unsurprising all at once, how this slow burn I've felt for her ignites into something _else,_ something that feels more like a volcanic eruption.

She licks her lips and I almost lose it. Like so many of her other pathetic admirers, I'm fixated on her. On the beauty and the disaster, on the fire and the fragility, on the triumph and tragedy that is Sakura Haruno. The _contradictions_ that make her such a hot mess, and so goddamn irresistible. Fixated. Infatuated.

Maybe something more than that, too, somewhere down the road. But for now, I'll settle for leaving my mark on her lips.

When I lean in to do just that, though, it's like Sakura realizes how bad this is on her own. And where I was willing to ignore it, she's got the sense to stop it. She inhales sharply and turns her head to the side, and I freeze.

"I should go inside," I hear her whisper through the roaring in my ears. "I have practice in the morning."

"Aa," I reply. I sound strangled. I can't believe what I was just about to do so I'm fine with ignoring it, just like she does. We pretend nothing was about to happen, nothing was about to change. She takes a step backwards and her hair slips through my fingers like sand; the smile on her face is the saddest I've ever seen.

"G'night, Sasuke," says Sakura, and I don't know if I imagine the tears in her eyes. "Thank you," she adds, cryptically. "I'm sorry," she finishes, and I don't know what she's apologizing for. I'm the one that should be sorry, thinking we could ever be anything but who we are.

I wait until she's safe in the warmth of her dorm – I ignore the way she doesn't look back out the window – and head back to my room in stony, untouchable silence. I don't feel the cold or care how late it is. And I'm too sensible to be disappointed in what almost went down, because that was always a huge, gigantic, horrific impossibility anyway, me and her. Nope. This is the way things should be.

I go my way. She goes hers. We meet in the middle sometimes to flirt with the idea of freedom and each other, but we back out before things go too far.

I've got a song to write anyway. I don't know what it's gonna be about. And I sure as shit don't care.

* * *

I get a phone call from Itachi later in the month. It's almost Christmas. He's coming home.

He sounds better these days, more lucid. Like he's sobering up before picking up the phone. I always liked him better sober. He tells me he might see Hana Inuzuka, since she'll be home for the holidays and her family lives in Konoha. I think about Kiba's reaction to them hanging out and decide I want no part of it.

He's staying at a hotel when he gets here – all I got is my dorm, we sold the house when our parents died – and he'll be here in a few days. Says he wants to hear my new songs, help me work on them a bit.

Doesn't show too much interest in my tattooing. He never really did, but maybe that's because I never told him how important it was to me.

Not like it matters, anyway. Soon I'll be graduating and tattooing will be a thing of the past. I won't have time for it when I get my record deal.

Itachi also says he wants to meet my friends.

A lot of 'em, he already knows. Kiba's Hana's little brother, so he met him already. Naruto and I have been friends for years, he knows Naruto pretty well. Of course, you can meet Naruto for half a second and learn all you need to know about him so that doesn't say much. Shikamaru and Neji, from the band, they've both met him before.

I struggle with the idea of introducing him to Sakura.

Are we friends? Sure. I spend more time with her than anyone else, actually. Neither one of us bring up what (almost) happened after the Union party the other week, and we settle right back into our routines. She goes to practice and her competitions and her classes and her workouts, I play my gigs and write my music and turn in my projects and we meet in the middle, at the shop. She hasn't called Tsunade. I knew she wouldn't, much as I wanted her to.

But Sakura's not the same as my other friends. I think she knows that, too. There's something indefinable about her, something that will make it difficult to explain her role in my life to my brother, who's the most important person in the world to me. I don't know if I'll be able to describe who she is to me, because 'friend' doesn't quite sum it up.

She's important, too. Just in a different way. And I can't figure out how to explain that to Itachi, not while maintaining that there's nothing going on between us. Especially because half the time, it feels like there is.

So I decide to ask Sakura about it directly. Maybe not the smartest idea, admitting to the girl I'm interested in that I don't know how to introduce her without sounding like I'm interested. But one night when I'm lagging behind at the shop and she's midway through her cleaning, I just bring it up.

"My brother's coming to visit," I say, not looking up from this sketch of a dragon I'm doing in my book.

"Oh, really?" I hear her reply, cheerfully, while she's polishing that stupid pewter wizard I hate. "That's great! His tour's on break, then?"

"Aa. For Christmas. Their manager cleared them to go home for a few days."

"Well that's awesome, Sasuke! Are you guys doing anything special?"

"No." I pause. "He wants to see my friends, though."

"I want to meet him, too!" she says eagerly, and I don't know why, but suddenly, I'm pissed.

What does she have to sound so eager for, anyway? Because Itachi's _famous?_ I feel a sudden surge of irrational, uncontrollable jealousy; maybe I misjudged Sakura. Maybe she's only in this bizarre friendship with me because, while I'm not good enough for her (don't I fucking know it) my famous _brother_ is?

I'm so pissed off I can't even focus on my drawing. Here I am, thinking Sakura's different…and I don't know why and I'm not proud of it, but as soon as I reconsider, I have this _disgusting_ image in my head, of that almost-kiss from the other week going a very different way, with my _brother_ in my place. Itachi and Sakura. She'd be just his fucking type, too. Beautiful and independent. I want to _vomit_ thinking about it, and how _dare_ she. How _dare_ she feature in this revolting daydream, how _dare_ she figure into the thousand other people who only want to know me because of my _brother?_

"I wish I could introduce you to some of _my_ family members," Sakura continues, and abruptly, her tone is sad, jerking me out of this hateful reverie. I look up at her, and see that she's polishing the same spot over and over, but her eyes are cloudy and faraway. "But that's not a possibility."

"Tch. And Itachi being a celebrity has nothing to do with it?" I press, and instantly I wonder if that was too harsh.

Sakura just rolls her eyes. "I'd want to meet your brother even if he washed dishes down at Ichiraku," she sniffs, returning to her work. "I'd like to meet someone who could tolerate your bad attitude for so long and still want to be around you."

I am not even _remotely_ offended at what she says, because it's so blisteringly honest. She's not interested in meeting Itachi because he's famous. She wants to meet him because he's my brother.

She's thinking in terms of _me._ And people don't do that in my life.

Here I am, sulking and whining and hating something that's not even happening. Inferiority complex. Little man syndrome. Whatever it is, I'm also sorry to have doubted her in the first place.

She's always been different. It's what I like most about her.

"He'll be here on Saturday," I tell her instead.

"That's the night of our holiday showcase," she groans. "One of the two most important nights of the year, naturally Miss Suzume's giving me hell for it."

"We'll go," I shrug. "Nothing else to do." _Nowhere I'd rather be._

Sakura smiles at me, then. Doesn't argue or protest, just accepts it. Confirms our plans with a twist of her lips, then dances over to the windows to clean them, too.

She thinks in terms of Sasuke. And I'm starting to think in terms of Sakura.

And not for the first time, I wish I was _anybody else. _Because if I was, then this all might actually mean something.

* * *

Itachi's sober when I meet him at the train station. Sober and smiling. His hair's longer than ever and his fingernails are painted – seems like you really have to sell out to make it big – but he's dressed in jeans and a sweatshirt, presumably to blend in. If he wore his signature red-cloud band gear, everyone would recognize him as the lead guitarist of Akatsuki.

He's got a suitcase in one hand and a guitar case in another, but he sets both down carelessly on the floor when he sees me. Strides up to me like he owns the place and hugs me.

I'm a seventeen-year-old boy, I hate being touched and affection doesn't cut it for me, but I hug him back, because he's my brother. And it's impossible not to feel happy when your big brother who you hate-love hugs you, and he's sober.

"I swear, you grow two feet every time I see you, little brother," he says when he pulls back, smiling.

"You sound like Mom," I mutter, and immediately wish I hadn't, since just saying her name makes me miss her.

Itachi just chuckles and ruffles my hair the way Mom used to.

"So what are our plans for tonight?" he asks me, picking up his suitcase and his guitar case and following me out of the train station. "After I check into my hotel."

"Hn. One of my friends is in the holiday showcase."

"Ahh," he says, knowingly. And I've told him a little bit about Sakura here and there, but nothing like this. Somehow he figures out which one of my friends will be performing. "Never took you to be the type to enjoy ballet, little brother. She must be very special."

"She's a _friend,_" I mutter with a slight emphasis on the word, even though it really doesn't fit Sakura right. I flag down a cab and Itachi slides in next to me; he tells the driver to take us to the motel he's staying at, and he spends the rest of the ride pressing me about Sakura.

Annoying older brother. Nosy and impetuous.

(I'm so happy he's home.)

* * *

The auditorium is packed to capacity that night. I secured tickets for my brother and me, and just in time, too. They're turning away students at the door. No room, not with all the recruiters inside.

It really is a huge deal for Sakura. Especially now that she's put the whole idea of Tsunade out of her mind, she's got to start reconsidering her options. She won't be accepted into the KCA ballet program, even if she's got the talent for it, so she has to look elsewhere. I should be happy for her, but I don't want her to be a ballerina. It doesn't make her happy. It never will, and she's lying to herself thinking anything's gonna change.

But really, who am I to judge?

We take our seats and it's right then that someone recognizes Itachi for the first time.

It's some underclassman. I don't know his name and I don't care to, but he's sitting in the row behind us when he starts whispering to his friends. Then, he taps Itachi on the shoulder.

"Hey, man," he says, when Itachi turns to see who's talking to him. "You're…shit, man, you _are._ You're Itachi _Uchiha!_ From _Akatsuki!_"

Itachi sighs wistfully before replying, "Yes I am. Pleased to meet you."

He turns his back to the kid, but now everyone sitting around us has heard the news. A celebrity in the audience of the holiday showcase. One of KPAA's own, who made it big. The whispering evolves into full-on shouting, and suddenly Itachi's surrounded by dozens of adoring fans clamoring for an autograph and a picture on their smartphones.

Such a typical scenario. I should be overcome with jealousy by it, but I'm not. Instead, I feel sorry for Itachi. He can't go anywhere without being recognized, hounded by fans. Never a moment's peace. Everyone wants a piece of him. No wonder he turned to alcohol.

At least here, I can still blend in when I need to.

Is that what's waiting for me out there, when I take my music professionally? No privacy, no solitude, no meaningful relationships…solace in the bottom of a bottle?

My endless internal angst is interrupted, then, when my cell phone vibrates in my pocket. Frowning – who's calling me now? Everyone's in the auditorium waiting for the show – I pull it out and see Sakura's number flashing on the Caller ID. What the hell is she doing, calling me ten minutes before she performs?

I lean away from Itachi's autograph session and answer. "What?"

"Sasuke, can you…can you come backstage really quick?" She sounds like she's been crying, and it twists something inside me. I cannot stand it when she cries.

"Right now? Sakura you go on in like ten minutes."

"I know, but…I really need to talk to someone. It's…it's gonna sound stupid but can you please just come back here?"

"Yeah," I murmur into my phone. "Where are you?"

"Dressing room. My name's on the door, just come in. And hurry."

I snap my phone shut and slip it back into my pocket, and I call over my shoulder to Itachi (who's surrounded by a deluge of rabid fans), "Be right back," before slipping out of our balcony row and downstairs, through the backstage door.

It's such a mess, so full of people in costumes getting ready to take the stage. The orchestra's tuning their instruments in the pit, the sound guys are checking the acoustics, the stage manager's running around like a chicken with his head cut off trying to get everyone in their place. No one really pays much attention to me as I weave through the whole mess to the dressing rooms. There's a door at the end of the hall marked SAKURA HARUNO – she's already important enough to have her own dressing room – and I enter without knocking.

"Sakura."

She's pacing back and forth in the cramped little space, looking dazzlingly gorgeous in a little white dress with sequins all over it, her hair up in a sleek bun on top of her head, her tiny feet covered in little satin slippers. She looks like a princess, except for the worry all over her face.

"You nervous?" I ask her, frowning. It's normal to be nervous, and Sakura's made a career out of it.

"Of course," she replies, "but that's not why I called you here. I just talked to Suzume…she's taking away Hinata's feature in the dance tonight. She just told me."

"Feature?"

"Yeah, Hinata has a solo midway through our routine. She's so excited about it, she's been working on it for _months._ But once Suzume found out that Tsunade's gonna be in the audience, she came barging into my room telling me to take the part and do it myself. Sasuke I _can't._ I just _can't_ do that to Hinata."

I don't know Hinata at all, just that she's a ballerina in Sakura's company. And I don't think much of them, after seeing the way they treat Sakura in their jealousy, so this doesn't sound terrible to me, but the way she's acting, it's the same thing as kicking a puppy.

"Why not?"

She looks stricken, scandalized. "Because…because she _wants it,_ so _badly._ Who am I to take it from her?"

"You're the best one in the company," I tell her impatiently. "Of course she wants you to do it."

"Is that the price of all this, Sasuke?" she whispers. "Is this what I need to do to prove my talent? I need to stab a friend in the back just to…just to make a _name_ for myself? To steal a part from a girl who's been working her _ass_ off just to give myself a boost in the eyes of the recruiters?"

Sakura looks like she's about to break down. Her shoulders shake and she wraps her arms tight around her stomach like she's trying to hold herself in one piece. She's never looked so small, so tragic, and my arms twitch at my sides to touch her, hold her, do _something…_

And then, something happens. Something bizarre, something I don't think I'll ever understand.

Sakura straightens up.

Her arms drop to her sides, she throws her shoulders back and she lifts her head. There aren't any tears in her eyes, nothing but determination, hot and fiery resolve. She's never looked this confident before. Never looked this beautiful.

"I won't do it," she tells me, her voice a low, boiling hiss. "Hinata practiced for that solo. And Hinata's gonna do it. I've given up enough for all this bullshit, I won't lose a friend over it, too."

I smirk. I'm proud of her. In a thousand ways, Sakura demonstrates every day that she isn't the typical dancer, that she isn't like the other opportunists populating this stupid school, but here, she's made it definitive. She's been pushed to her limits all this time, but there are lines even she won't cross. There will be consequences, I'm sure, but she's held onto her integrity.

She won't sell out, the way the rest of us will.

"Thank you, Sasuke," she whispers.

What did I do? Nothing.

But then her arms are around my neck and when she presses up against me, she smells like daisies and sunshine in the dead of winter.

"What're you thanking me for?" I ask stiffly, not hugging her back. I don't trust myself to.

She pulls back and smiles beautifully. "For being who you are," she tells me sweetly, sincerely.

And she stands on tiptoe and kisses me on the corner of my mouth. I'm too stunned to move, too stunned to reciprocate, and it's over in a flash. "I have to get going," she tells me, her breath fanning against my throat. "I don't care what Suzume says. She might kick me out of the company after this, I don't care. But Hinata's doing that fucking solo. I'll see you after this, okay? You and your brother."

"Break a leg," I manage, and she beams at me before dancing out into the hallway to take the stage in an act of pure rebellion. And I'm left standing there alone in her dressing room, with the air smelling like daisies and the rug pulled out from under me, on top of the world.

* * *

"She's very beautiful, little brother," Itachi murmurs to me during the group ballet performance. I pointed out Sakura to him and his comment doesn't rankle me like it ought to. Not when _I'm_ the one she kissed, sort of. "You're certain there's nothing going on between you but _friendship?_"

"I'm certain." You don't always have to tell your brother the truth.

"She's a wonderful dancer. She'll be accepted anywhere she applies, with technique like that."

"Tch. What do _you_ know about _ballet._"

"Much, much more than you, I'm sure."

No one shushes us. Even at a ballet recital, you don't shush a rock star. Or his sulky, brooding little brother. One of the few perks of being related to rock royalty.

I'm not sure what to look for during the dance but Sakura draws my eye, she always does. But at a crucial moment in the music, the part I'm sure is the solo she was asked to take, she takes a _knee._ Just plants her knee on the stage like it's football practice, and she makes a jerky motion to a ballerina with black hair in a tight bun. I watch her mouth, _Go for it_ and realize the girl she's waving at must be Hinata.

My eyes dart to the teacher hovering backstage, Miss Suzume. The woman Sakura's so intimidated by. She's got her mouth wide open, jaw on the floor, beady eyes behind her glasses full of rage as Sakura commits mutiny. Then Hinata gets the hint and rushes to the center of the stage to perform the solo, and I wonder if anyone notices Sakura's mini-revolution.

There's a subtle, satisfied smirk on her face. I don't know if anyone else can see it, and it's only there for a few seconds before she joins the other ballerinas in a group while Hinata keeps up with her reclaimed solo in the spotlight. But I recognize it right away.

She's happy.

It's not like she's done something _catastrophic._ She's still in that toxic ballet program, still a slave to her craft, still a part of all the bullshit. But she's made one small, tiny step in the other direction: she won't compromise her values. And to Sakura, friendship is more important than a leg up on the competition.

It's like seeing her come to life, just a little. Not all the way there yet, but a hell of a lot further down the path than I am.

It raises an uncomfortable question. And sitting in the plush balcony seats watching a student-production of _Swan Lake_ might not be the best time to mull this over, but hell if I can stop it.

Am I willing to do the same thing she's done? Challenge the cage I'm in? Push the boundaries? Take back some of my self-respect without worrying about the consequences?

I don't want to do music anymore. I don't want to play my guitar. I don't want to write one more stupid, empty, meaningless song. I want no part of the life Itachi's living. But is it too late to give it all up? Or am I in too deep?

"Ah, Hana's here," Itachi says softly, and I look off to where he's looking. Seems Hana's been invited back to play in the student orchestra. She's sitting in the pit with her gigantic cello. "Little brother…you should know that sometimes in life, you'll be given unimaginably appealing opportunities…opportunities it feels like you just can't say no to. But what they'll never tell you is the price you'll have to pay. In the end…sometimes it's simply not worth it. And you'll be left wondering what you could possibly do to get it all back."

He's talking about Hana. I'm thinking about Sakura. And art and my designs at the shop and the new tattoos on my body and on my clients. And I'm thinking about late night movies and pizza, and new needles and ink, and daisies and sunshine. What could I give up? What couldn't I live without?

How much is too much?

"So when you find something that makes you happy," he continues wistfully, speaking like a tragic hero, "hold onto it with both arms and all of your heart. And don't let anyone take it away from you."

It buoys me up. That speech, and Sakura's act of rebellion. The way she pushes the limits I thought she could never break out of, the way he's been through it all and dispenses advice that couldn't be more needed. Suddenly these chains of music seem a lot more breakable than they did this morning.

* * *

Later, though, I'll see the consequences for these revolutions of resolve. I'll see Itachi walk up to Hana with flowers in his arms. I'll see her take the flowers with a blush – then take another man's hand. Her new boyfriend's. And she'll say something polite to Itachi and he'll watch her leave and I'll watch him watch her. And I'll see all the regret, all the could've-beens, all the can-never-be-agains. And I'll see him slide a flask from inside his jacket and bring it to his lips like an old lover.

And when I take him backstage to meet Sakura, I'll see the puffiness in her eyes that suggest she's been crying. And the red handprint gleaming hot on her cheek that says Miss Suzume didn't think much of her refusing to take Hinata's solo.

And I'll see the way they both pretend not to notice the mess that the other one is, the way they'll shake hands and say 'Nice to meet you.' The way they'll cover up their wounds and their scars and continue plowing on in this cutthroat industry, since they're in too deep.

And even if it felt different, even if it felt like I was free, for that one fucking _minute…_I realize I'm in too deep, too.

Too deep, and way over my head.

* * *

**note..** hey.


	11. Rond de Jambe

Changing someone's choreography is considered completely disrespectful in the dance industry.

I know this really well by now. And Miss Suzume – for all her faults – always makes sure that my solos and duets and features are choreographed beautifully, so the last thing I'd ever want to do is offend her. Or anyone else. I have huge respect for choreographers; they conceptualize something that isn't real yet, and have the skill to translate their vision from mere conjecture into something physical.

But what she tried to do to Hinata…that went too far.

I don't think I regret doing what I did.

It was blatantly obvious, of course. Took everyone off-guard, including Hinata; she'd just gotten the news from Miss Suzume that her feature was being taken away from her and given to me, and was appropriately devastated about it. She didn't expect me to turn around and give it right back to her.

(She danced it beautifully, though. With more heart and soul than I ever could. And she deserved the standing ovation.)

Miss Suzume, of course, wasn't happy. Waited till we danced off into the wings before yanking me aside, screaming in my face, then smacking me for good measure.

"_Blatant disrespect,_" she hissed, while I just stood there, shocked that she'd actually put her hands on me. "I bend over _backwards_ to give you that feature, and like a fucking _ingrate,_ you sabotage the entire dance just to give your little friend the chance to shine? You will _never_make it in this industry with an attitude like that, and if you pull another stunt like that again, _ever in my studio,_ I'll see to it that you're blacklisted from _every_ employable market in the dance world, you stupid little _nothing._"

Her words ring in my ears. I don't doubt that she has that kind of pull, either. Say what you want about her, but Miss Suzume gets results. She's got a million contacts in the dance business and can either make or break you as a dancer, depending on whether or not you displease her. And I'm starting to wonder if this rebellious phase I'm going through – liberating as it is – is worth what I'm risking. My entire future rides on Miss Suzume, and the last thing you want to be doing is stepping on the toes of the woman who's controlling your career.

"You should report her," Sasuke mutters next to me, yanking me out of my thoughts.

"Huh?" I ask intelligently.

"Your teacher. She hit you."

"It happens," I shrug, aware that I sound like I'm suffering from battered wife syndrome. Making excuses for the person who beats me, rationalizing away my right to safety because I've convinced myself I _deserve_ this.

It's snowing a little as we walk towards the coffeeshop with a bunch of our friends and Sasuke's older brother, Itachi. First snow of the season. It's not laying properly, not the kind that sticks, and it's freezing as hell, but the little girl inside me still gets excited when it snows. Especially since Christmas is two days away.

Itachi seems nice. He doesn't ask about this glaring, awful handprint on my face. Maybe Sasuke headed him off.

"She's got no right to put her hands on you," Sasuke protests, keeping his voice quiet, though, so the others can't hear us. I chance a glance behind us and see that Naruto's got the attention of all our friends, loudly regaling Itachi with the details of his band's most recent gig. No one's really paying us any mind.

I sigh, a little exasperated with his attitude, because he might understand me, but he doesn't understand the industry I'm in.

"I fucked up her choreography," I explain, fully cognizant of the fact that it doesn't justify teacher-student violence, at least not to an objective outsider. "In the dance world, that's like a huge 'fuck you.' You just don't _do_ it. I can't blame her for flipping out like that, I'm lucky she didn't throw me off the team."

"You sound ridiculous," he snaps at me.

"God, just leave it _alone,_ Sasuke!" I shoot back. I've got enough to worry about, don't I? Without him pulling this self-righteous, overprotective bullshit card on me, like he's got any right. I can take care of myself, I was doing it way before I met _him._

I speed up a little, hoping to shake him off for a bit, but he matches my pace effortlessly, sparing me a glare that suggests he's not impressed. "Don't run away from me," he growls. "This is _serious._ I'm sick of having to look out for you, since you apparently refuse to do it yourself."

I don't mean to be rude to his brother, since I really was looking forward to meeting him, but this whole night – triumphant as it was, for a few minutes – is a complete fucking disaster. I'm mad at Sasuke now for being so overbearing, I'm mad at Miss Suzume for being _herself, _and I'm mad at myself for ever thinking I had the balls to change my circumstances. I'm in a rotten mood, and all I want to do is go back to bed.

So I stop right in my tracks and turn around, push past Sasuke, and smile up at his brother apologetically.

"I'm really sorry to bail right now, but I'm _beat,_" I say, giggling. "D'you mind if I just head back to my room for the night? I'll catch up with you guys tomorrow, if you've still got some time."

"No problem," says Itachi with a warm smile. Vaguely, I wonder if Sasuke can smile like that, all polite and sincere and shit. I've only ever seen him smirk. "You danced beautifully, Sakura. I'm sure you could do with a good night's rest. It was lovely to have met you."

"You, too," I reply, reaching out to shake his hand, and blushing like a moron when he takes my hand and kisses it instead. He's nothing like the hard-partying rocker he's portrayed to be on TV. If anything, he's kind of a gentleman.

Not my type at all, but it's really interesting how different people are in reality than who you think they are.

(I don't know. I guess I've always had a thing for bad boys.)

"See you guys," I say to Naruto and Kiba and Ino and everyone else. Everyone's more than used to my exceptional talent at avoiding things and retreating off to my room, and don't kick up a fuss.

I feel Sasuke's eyes boring into the back of my head as I leave them all for my dorm, but I ignore him. I ignore the crackling tension between us for once. Tonight was awful. I just want to be alone.

* * *

After my shower, my muscles ache.

My own fault. I worked out early this morning, rehearsed hard this afternoon, went all out instead of just marking time the way you're supposed to during practice, then danced my heart out at the recital. Pain's a pretty good teacher, though, and I know I deserve these aches for my negligence.

In this field, you get pretty good at accepting shit you deserve.

I yank on a tank top and a pair of cotton shorts (I sleep in as little clothes as possible under as many blankets as possible) and hop up onto my bed, fully content to massage my sore leg muscles and fall asleep pissed at everything. I know I'm taking my anger out on the wrong people – I know that Sasuke was just looking out for me in his own overbearing, abrasive way – but is it too much to ask for a little _space?_ That maybe I'm doing the best I fucking can, and I know it ain't fucking good enough, but do I really need _him_ to get in my face about it?

I'm exhausted, but it's the physical exhaustion. Like, my body's worn out and needs rest, and I'm way overdue for sleep and my brain knows that, but there are so many thoughts running through my head that sleep is the last thing on my mind. Too tired to sleep.

Tsunade was in the audience tonight. Tsunade saw me take a golden opportunity to show her what I can do – to make her reconsider her opinion about my attitude towards ballet – and throw it the fuck away. Without her knowing the back story, that I was just trying to help out a friend, it must've looked like I succumbed to stagefright or something (as _if) _and choked. Oh, yeah. That'll convince her that I belong in her ballet program for _sure._ Ugh. I want to throw up.

But today I forgot to eat again, so there's not much chance of that happening.

I should go to the infirmary and ask for a proper massage, I know that. My hands don't do the trick as well as someone else's, I can't get the right angle or apply the right amount of pressure to ease some of the tension. And my whole body's all locked up with stress and shit and I can't get myself to relax, to loosen up. I'm so _sick_ of feeling this way, like I'm about to snap at any second, but the shitty thing is, I don't know any other way to function.

_I'm just a hot fucking mess, aren't I,_ I think with a sneer, flopping back onto my pillows in surrender.

I'm not sure how long I just _lay_ there, hating everything, frustrated with myself and these circumstances I created and can't escape from, but it's very, very late and I am very, very tired when there's a knock at my door.

It's probably Ino, who should know better by now. She knows that when I've had a bad night at dance, the last thing I want is someone to come talk to me about it. She's good about that, giving me space when I'm in a rotten mood.

"Not now, Ino," I mumble, loud enough for her to hear it through the door.

"It's Sasuke," the decidedly masculine voice on the other side disputes. "Open the door, Sakura."

Sasuke? What the hell is he doing here, he's supposed to be with his brother!

"I'm not in the _mood,_ Sasuke," I snap back, still annoyed with him and the way he talked to me tonight. Acting as if I can't handle myself. Jerk. He knows nothing about this so he shouldn't open his fucking mouth.

"Sakura, let me _in._"

Sasuke's not the kind of guy you say no to, but some primal part of me likes to push his buttons. Defy him just because nobody else has the guts to, and I like feeling brave for a few seconds.

"What part of _no_ don't you understand?"

But stupid me's forgotten to lock the door, something Sasuke knows I do on a regular basis, so all he has to do is turn the knob and then he's inside, closing himself in with me and giving me a look that tells me he's not happy with my attitude.

I know I'm being a whiny, miserable, bitchy little brat, but Jesus. I had a bad day. Everyone's entitled to a bad day, right?

"You really can't take a _hint,_ can you?" I hiss cattily.

He just sits down on the bed next to me, entirely uninvited, but he looks so good in that gray button-down shirt and those black jeans with that gorgeous face of us, and I kind of like the way he feels comfortable enough to sit in bed with me. Still pissed, though.

"What's your problem tonight?" Sasuke demands, folding his arms, like he's entitled to all the answers in the world, just because he wants them.

"_Clearly_ I had a bad _night._ Shouldn't you be with your brother?"

"He went back to his hotel for the night. Answer my question."

"I did! Jesus, is this the Spanish Inquisition? I'm having a bad night, I'm not in the mood to talk to people right now, I just want a little time to myself. Is that so much to ask for?"

Sasuke rolls his eyes and leans his back against the headboard. He makes me so mad I just want to scream, but since he doesn't show any signs of wanting to leave (and I'm not so sure I want him to, either), I give up and decide to just ignore his presence in my room. I return to my leg massage, getting angrier and angrier that I can't erase the kinks in my muscles the way I want to. This stupid night, it's all just so fucking _stupid._

"You're doing it wrong," Sasuke tells me critically, and I look up at him to see him eyeing the way I'm rubbing my thigh with both hands. "You're going too hard, and working against the muscle instead of with it."

"Oh, I see," I snap before I can stop myself. "So now you're this hotshot tattooer and this awesome guitar player and on top of all that, you're also the world's best _massage therapist?_ God, Sasuke, _blow me._"

I'm being so fucking mean to him, I can hear it in my voice, but I'm tired and cranky and sore and worried and stressed, and I _did_ warn him to leave me alone, didn't i? He's the one who's in here putting up with all my abuse.

But instead of getting angry or offended at the way I'm bitching at him, Sasuke does something I'm not ready for. He swats my hands away from my left leg and begins massaging it himself.

I go braindead, I swear. Like, I forget everything, from my bad mood to my _name,_ because this feels ridiculously, impossibly good. Maybe he _is_ the world's best massage therapist, because as his big strong hands knead the aching muscle in my thigh, I feel a sort of bruised catharsis, like all the pain's leaving my body in a mass exodus. It hasn't even been five seconds.

"Oh," I manage, feeling a blush heat my cheeks.

Sasuke goes slow, his gaze on my leg in concentration, moving up my thigh and back down towards my knee. The feel of his hands on my bare skin is _electrifying;_ keep in mind, I've been dancing for years and have done plenty of routines with male dancers, guys who have touched every inch of my body during a performance, but it is _nothing_ like this.

It should be platonic, but there's something indisputably intimate about the situation. The room is quiet and it's late and we're alone in this too-small bed, Sasuke's hands moving slowly and purposefully up and down the inside of my thigh. He doesn't speak and neither do I; the only sound in the room is my hitched breathing.

He switches to my other leg and I surreptitiously rub my thighs against each other to ease some of the brand new tension stirring between them, tension that has nothing to do with working myself too hard at the studio. It's a new feeling, something foreign, something like the way it felt when we almost, _almost_ kissed each other the other night, only fiercer. More urgent.

"I," I begin, hesitant, "um…Sasuke…"

He looks up at me from under his dark fringe, silver-black eyes narrowed like he's trying to gauge my reaction to his ministrations. The idea of him stopping is unbearable, but this heat between my legs won't quit, it only gets hotter. I want more of _something,_ but I can't figure out what it is.

"I'm sorry," I manage, and with those words, I feel all the fight leave me. Sasuke's working the pain out of my muscles, so it's time I work myself out of this funk. "I know I'm being a royal bitch tonight. It's not you. You're just looking out for me, I know."

He smirks, but it looks more like a smile than anything, which makes me glow. I made him _smile,_ sort of.

"You roll your muscle too fast," he tells me, explaining his massage as he gives it. I try to pay attention to this lesson, but it's impossible to take my eyes off his thin lips, or the glint of his perfect white teeth as he speaks. What would it feel like? To have those teeth nip at my skin? "You have to work it out slow, or you'll bruise."

I want to ask him how come he knows so much about this – doesn't seem like something the typical guitarist knows, full body massage – but it feels so good that I can't articulate the words. I just lay back against the pillows and imagine him playing my body like he plays his guitar, with quick fingers and quiet concentration. I clench and unclench my thighs to take away some of this foreign ache and wonder if he notices what he's _doing_ to me.

A few minutes later, though, Sasuke switches gears. The pressure he's applying lessens, and his hands climb higher on my legs.

I look at him curiously and see that, far from paying a lick of attention to this massage, his gaze is hot and heavy on my face. Like he's trying to get a rise out of me. Pushing _my_ buttons the way I pushed his. The intimacy of the situation is choking, stifling, and I feel my breath catch in my throat.

"S-Sasuke…"

One of his hands slides smoothly down my thigh and hooks beneath my knee. Without a word, Sasuke pulls it up around his waist and leans in so he's hovering over me, his dark eyes half-hidded and full of purpose as he leans in closer.

"Better?" he asks me with a little smirk that drives me _crazy._

"Y-Yeah. It's…I mean…Sasuke what are…what are we doing?"

The first kiss he gives me is innocent. Chaste. Just a fleeting pressure on my lips before he pulls back to study my reaction, his dark eyes probing, and I know my face has got to be on fire, but that is _nothing_ compared to the blaze of arousal stirring in my abdomen. On instinct, I press my hips closer to his, my hand sliding up his side and settling in his soft black hair; his expression darkens and when he kisses me again, it's not innocent or chaste or anything remotely like that.

It's like an _explosion._

An eruption, maybe. Like when an unstoppable force meets an immovable object, or something like that. Putting out fire with gasoline.

I let out a squeak against his mouth and he uses that window of opportunity to deepen the kiss, pressing me down into the mattress with his body, hot and hard on top of me. I'm barely dressed and overdressed all at once, locking my knee around his waist to bring his hips violently to mine.

The flexibility I learned from dance is paying off in an entirely new, unexpected way.

I've never done _anything_ like this. I've never even _kissed_ a boy. I don't know if I'm doing it right, but it feels kind of natural. Easy, almost. I understand my body, I know how it works and how it moves, so it's easy for me to orient myself around Sasuke, to apply the right amount of pressure at the right time, to bend and twist when he moves; I follow his lead as he slips his tongue into my mouth and soon I know those steps, too.

"Jesus, Sakura," he growls, pulling back to catch his breath. I'm too shocked to say anything in response, because his thumb digs into my hipbone and makes me squeak. I never even realized I was sensitive there, so how could he have known?

This is a _mess._ What am I even _doing_ right now? Making out in the middle of the night with Sasuke Uchiha? Two minutes ago, we were fighting like children, now he's got me wrapped around him like a bad dream, cussing against my skin and making me gasp.

No one hears us, thankfully. At least I hope so. The walls are thin here. Wouldn't it be the sweetest, juiciest piece of gossip in KPAA _history,_ if anyone were to find out that uptight, workaholic Sakura Haruno was hooking up with the brooding school heartthrob at 2 AM?

And it's all happening so quickly, too. I know where this is going. I know Sasuke's got to know, too, but it's getting harder and harder to concentrate on all the ways this could end badly. Not when he feels so _good_ against me, his hands all over me, his lips on mine and his scent soaking into my sheets. He drives his knee between my legs and the pressure sends my hormones into overdrive.

Passion. _Passion._ Before Sasuke, I never knew I could feel something like this outside of a studio. Without the familiar arpeggios and crescendos of a classic suite, without the light-as-air security of satin ballet slippers, I never knew a person could feel this _much._ Not till I met Sasuke, who's wrong for me in every sense of the word, but who doesn't even have to _try_ to turn me inside out.

It's _terrifying._ That this kind of fire can exist outside of music and movement, when I thought, when I could have _sworn_ it was restricted to ballet. But this, this is just a new style of dance. This is nothing and exactly like learning the steps to a different style, training myself to move with someone else. Learning someone else's body the way I know my own. Terrifying that this was simmering between us all this time, like a live wire.

And I can't get enough. I can't fucking get enough.

"Sasuke!" I hiss in his ear, as his fingers flirt with the hemline of my shorts. "_God,_ Sasuke, that feels…oh my _God._"

"I love it," he snarls back, his teeth catching my earlobe and it takes _everything_ in me not to _scream._ "When you say my name like that. Jesus _Christ._"

I'm swept away, completely and entirely, by Sasuke Uchiha. I want him, badly, and I can tell by the frantic way he moves, by the frantic way he touches me, by the way his self-control is waning and he's starting to let himself go, that he wants me, too. I'm in _love_ with the way he snarls and cusses in my ear, with his hot breath fanning against my skin, with _everything_ about this crazy fucking night. I feel his hand slide up the leg of my shorts, his thumb stroking the front of my panties, and I almost _lose it_ right there.

It's like someone's coiling wire tighter and tighter inside my stomach, the way it feels like I'm about to break. I don't know what's happening to me, at _all,_ just that this feels fucking _amazing_ and if he stops, I'm gonna die. I don't know what'll happen when the coil finally snaps but I am fucking _desperate_ to find out.

Then there's the loud, jarring sound of a phone vibrating to totally interrupt what's going on.

It's not my phone; my vibrate tone is a lot milder than this. It's Sasuke's. He pulls back slightly to look at me inquisitively, wondering silently if we should stop.

"It might be your brother," I pant, nearly out of breath. "Just…just check it."

It's a sign, for sure. To tell us to slow the _fuck_ down before we do something we regret, something we can't take back. I feel the coil, which had been so _close_ to snapping, loosening again, and as Sasuke slowly withdraws his fingers from under my shorts, I'm so disappointed I actually feel _tears_ burning in my eyes.

It's like making it all the way to the climax of a routine, and taking a knee instead of finishing strong.

But like hell am I gonna let him see me get all weepy, just because we were interrupted in this unexpected, unannounced hook-up, so I sit up abruptly as he climbs off of me to answer his phone across the room. Try and restore some semblance of order to my appearance. I catch a glimpse of myself in my mirror: my hair's a wild, curly mess and my lips are almost bruised. Perfect.

"The hell are you calling me for this late at night?" Sasuke snaps into the phone.

I can't hear the other person on the line, and I don't really care, honestly. I'm too busy trying to get my heart to calm down, trying to comprehend what just happened here.

_I just made out with Sasuke,_ I think, blown away by the reality of it as I run an errant hand through my tangled mess of hair. _I just MADE OUT with SASUKE._

My first kiss, my first hook-up, all of it happened so quickly and all at once, and now I'm trying to slow it all down so I can process it properly. I'm _exhilarated_, and I'm _frustrated,_ and I'm _giddy as fuck_ because now that I've done it, now that I've kissed him, now that I've felt him kiss me back and heard him growl my name like an _animal,_ I realize how long I've wanted him to do this. How long I've wanted this to happen.

I just made out with Sasuke.

"It ain't my business what he does," Sasuke snarls, and I look at him in surprise. The top three buttons of his shirt are undone – with a blush, I realize how eager I must have been, since I don't even remember unbuttoning them – and he looks _furious_ as he argues into his phone. "Leave me outta this shit."

I hear yelling on the other end and frown in confusion. What's going on, this late at night, to warrant Sasuke's anger?

"Fuck it," Sasuke snaps. "I'll be back in five minutes. Jesus Christ."

With that he shuts his phone on whoever's shouting at him on the other line and jams it back into his pocket. Without looking at me, he mutters, "I gotta go."

"You…wait, what? What's wrong, Sasuke? What's going on?"

"My dumbass brother," he says reluctantly, buttoning his shirt again.

"Is he okay? I thought he went back to his hotel…"

"He did," Sasuke spits. "With Kiba's sister. That was Kiba on the phone just now, he found out and he's pissed as shit."

"Your brother's with Kiba's _sister?_"

"They dated a few years ago," Sasuke tells me, throwing on his leather jacket. "Kiba came looking for me at my room, couldn't find me…none of 'em know I was here, with you."

"Oh. Um, okay, that's fine." It's not fine. I don't like the way this is going, at _all._ Am I just some dirty little secret, then? He's ashamed to admit what he did with me tonight? What we _almost_ did? "Do you need anything, or…?"

I don't know if he sees something in my face or what, but Sasuke's expression softens, and he sighs.

"You're fine," he tells me, and when I look up at him again, he kisses me, like reassurance. First on my lips, then on my cheek, where an hour ago, a nasty red handprint shone like hot coals. "Go to sleep. I'll see you tomorrow."

"Kay," I say quietly, and I smile, because I feel better. "'Night, Sasuke."

He smirks (I'll call it a smile in my head) and closes the door behind him on his way out. And I'm left to replay the last few minutes in my head like a song on repeat, inhaling Sasuke's amazing scent on my blankets. There's no soreness in my muscles at all, anymore.

* * *

**note..** hey everybodyyy.

first, about my characterizations: we all see these characters differently. and the way i see sakura is that she's a classic overachiever with all sorts of mental hangups, and that's what makes her so interesting. she's depicted in the manga as very smart, very pretty, compassionate, and (lately) a strong, capable kunoichi. when you place her in an AU setting, you have to kind of transcribe those qualities to keep her true to your vision of who she is. and what makes sakura such a cool character to me is that even with all her good qualities, she's still such a headcase. she has confidence issues and an inferiority complex, she second-guesses herself and her decisions, has a horrible self-image, trust issues, and a bad temper. she's a fluffy fairy princess to a certain extent, but a total disaster inside. and i love that about her.

again, that's the way i see her. so in my stories, yeah: she's got all kinds of good qualities. but they're counterbalanced by her flaws. if that makes sense. but yeah, everybody sees them in a different light. that's why some people identify the archetypal canon pairing in naruto as sakura with sasuke (like i see it,) but others interpet it to be sasuke with naruto. you could make a case for both. and i think as long as you can defend it, then it's kosher. yafeel? :)

anyway. i really like working on this story and i really hope you enjoy reading it. let me know? :)

xoxo daisy :)


	12. Tracing

I hate Itachi.

I hate Kiba.

I hate myself, for leaving.

Sakura doesn't know I do it, but as soon as I close the door behind me, I stand there for a few seconds, my back up against it as I try and stop breathing so hard. I want her _so fucking badly_ and if Kiba hadn't called me to interrupt, I'm 98% sure I could've had her.

I can't block it out, the way her thin, muscular thighs felt underneath my hands. The open trust in her eyes melting into something like…I don't even know if I can describe that look, but I sure as hell understood it. Her flat, tight little stomach pressed against me, the soft roundness of her breasts, the smell of her hair and her skin and…her body is _ridiculous,_ all that dance over all those years…

I _hate_ Itachi.

I know the moment's gone, and that tonight, at least, I can't get it back. But I'm not sure why Kiba thinks _I _have any control over Itachi, because I don't. Never did, never will. What he does – with or without Kiba's sister – is none of my business since it's out of the realm of my control. Me showing up to their motel isn't gonna stop them from getting together, whether or not she's got a boyfriend who isn't Itachi and whether or not he's bad for her. And it's not my place to say which, and it's not Kiba's either.

I press my forehead against Sakura's door, trying to tamp down all these foreign emotions so I'm clear-headed enough for a fight, but I hear her rummaging around inside her room and it distracts me. I hear her flick the TV on and a gusty little sigh as she settles herself back down on the bed.

I want to lay down with her. I want to blow off this stupid Kiba-Itachi-Hana situation because it's not my business, and what _is_ my business is this smoking hot anorexic disaster and all the ways I could have had her, all the ways I can _still_ have her if I play my cards right. And if I can't have that, I'd settle for letting her sleep in the crook of my arm. I'd settle for letting her taunt me with things I can't have, I'd settle for taking what little she of herself she'll give me.

Instead, though, I think about my famous, foolish, alcoholic older brother and all the ways _he_ might need me. With a final growl of longing, I step away from Sakura's door and stalk angrily down the stairs into the bitter late night cold outside.

It's Christmas Eve, I realize belatedly. And just as I think it, it starts to snow. Not the kind that sticks and is a pain in the ass, or the kind that would get classes canceled if they were still in session. It's the kind that blows around fat and white and melts as soon as it touches your skin. Just enough for winter to remind you that it's here, and it could snow if it really wanted to, and here's a taste.

It's hard to get into the holiday spirit – hard to get into the spirit of _anything_ lately – but I know it's made worse by the fact that the roles are reversed this year, and I'm supposed to look out for my big brother.

What's he doing, messing around with a girl with a boyfriend? What's he doing, trying to cross bridges he burned a long time ago? We both know he fucked up something great with Kiba's sister. Why is it on me, now, to fix everything? Why can't my big brother be the stand-up guy he used to be, the guy who always knows what's up the way he used to, the guy who's looking out for _me_ instead of the other way around?

_Fucking idiot,_ I think, stalking off campus and down the street. His motel isn't far away, but it's cold and it's late and I'm pissed, because before this bullshit, I was about three seconds from closing a deal with the prettiest, most self-destructive girl on campus. But in what's becoming a really annoying habit lately, I have to stop what I'm doing, drop everything that's a priority for me, and focus on Itachi, and all the ways this lifestyle that he's chosen for himself is destroying him.

I'm sick of this habit. I'm sick of this bullshit, day in and day out. Itachi's the most important person in the world to me. Does that mean it's _always_ on me to clean up his messes, when it _should_ be the other way around?

* * *

After the way Kiba was shouting and yelling and cussing into the phone earlier, I expect to walk into this huge, melodramatic battle royale between him and my big brother. Maybe Hana crying or something in the corner. Maybe her boyfriend – once he found out what happened between them – getting in on the action.

But when I request (demand) Itachi's room number from a hassled-looking night clerk at the front desk, the motel's quiet. There's no sound of disturbance, nothing to suggest that there's anything even remotely wrong, nothing to suggest that there's an alcoholic, drug-addicted rock star spiraling out of control and dragging everyone down with him. But I don't let my guard down as I take the stairs up to the second floor.

Room 224 of the Konoha Regency Inn (fancy name for a shitty motel) is as quiet as any other room this late at night. The door's closed but not locked, and I open it to find a moderately-clean room with the TV on mute, and my burning star brother vomiting his guts out in the bathroom.

"Jesus," I mutter, seeing the empty bottles strewn about the room. He's been drinking again. I sigh. Disappointing, but not surprising. I start picking everything up while Itachi finishes in the bathroom, tossing the bottles away, and it feels a lot like hiding evidence, covering up after a crime. I don't want anyone to see my brother like this.

Hell, _I _don't want to see him like this. At all.

Most incriminating of all, when I'm disposing of more bottles than one man should be able to drink in a week, I come across a ripped-up little packet on the floor near the trashcan, clearly thrown away with haste. A little gold condom wrapper, damning evidence as to what transpired here tonight. Even without Kiba screaming it in my ear, I can confirm that Itachi slept with Hana, and now, somehow, that's my responsibility to handle.

I hear the toilet flush, and a gusty, world-weary sigh that tells me Itachi's finishing up. Then the water runs, he must be cleaning himself up, brushing his teeth and washing his face and shit. And then he stumbles out of the bathroom again, and he looks like hell.

"The hell happened?" I demand, narrowing my eyes at him as he slumps down on the edge of the bed, his head in his hands. Long hair's knotted and messy around his face, his skin's sallow, and his eyes are glassy and rimmed red. The poster child for self-destruction. My favorite part is the black-and-blue mark over his left eye; Kiba hadn't left without a parting favor.

"She said she missed me," Itachi babbles, and it sounds like he's not even talking to me personally. Rather, he's reminding himself of what happened. There's a note of delirious joy in his garbled speech, like he can't believe it himself. "She missed me, little brother. _She_ did."

"Why'd fucking Kiba call me telling me to come over here?"

Itachi snatches a water bottle from the mini fridge and takes a liberal gulp from it, then lays back against the pillows. Chipped nail polish and sweat. The acrid stench of vomit hangs in the air between us. He's gained twenty years out of nowhere as he breathes deep, in and out, before answering.

"He suspected me and Hana."

"It's none of his business," I mutter, almost guilty. Like I have to protect my brother from my big bad friends, since he just doesn't know any better. I pull the curtains closed to the outside balcony, just in case a bird flies by and sees the complete fucking meltdown happening in this room.

"You suspected us, too."

"It's not my business, either. You can do what you want."

"Ah, but you don't approve," says Itachi with a smile that's so full of fucking sadness I want to punch it right off his mouth. "And why should you? Why should anyone be pleased, that I saw an opening tonight and took advantage of it?"

"You didn't force her to do anything. She didn't have to come here with you. That was her choice."

"Choices," Itachi muses to himself, testing the word on his slurring tongue. "No, I didn't force her. But it would have been kinder, to hold her at arm's length. Wouldn't it?"

I roll my eyes. I'm not in the mood to hear my brother wax philosophical like he always does when he's drunk. I'm getting angrier and angrier being here, having to clean up after everyone _again,_ and what do I even _care_ if Kiba's sister – a grown-ass woman capable of making her own goddamn decisions – decides she wants to cheat on her current boyfriend with her old one? I don't give a shit.

"I hurt her, deeply, in the past," he tells me. And I listen, even if I don't want to, because who else has he got? "I know I did. And everything fell apart, and it was my fault. She did everything she could to keep us together, but I couldn't be held down. I didn't want anything to tie me down, rein me in." A bark of a laugh, humorless and self-loathing. "It's ironic, Sasuke. How desperate one can be, in the relentless pursuit of freedom. And how foolish, to discard what could have been – _what should have been – _a permanent, everlasting bond. I had Hana, and then I didn't. And tonight, I thought I could have her again."

"She still cares about you," I grumble, even though this is all hitting a little too close to home and I'd rather be asleep in my dorm, forgetting this night ever happened, than here. "Isn't that all that matters?"

"Oh, Sasuke. You're still so _young._"

He says it so patronizingly that instantly, my temper's rising. Here I am, the seventeen-year-old _kid_ having to clean up after his big brother, having to pull him to his feet and throw out all his empty liquor bottles at 3 am, and he's still talking to me like he knows so much better than me. Like he's seen it all before, and I'm some ignorant, naïve little _brat_ trying to sneak into a rated-R movie.

"I gave her the choice, of coming with me tonight, or saying goodbye as friends," Itachi goes on. "But it would have been far more merciful to have stayed out of her life completely. Instead, because of me, she's cheated on her boyfriend, someone who can give her all the things I'll never be able to, someone who wouldn't leave her the way I did. And in my selfishness, in my desperate need to _feel her, _to _remember_, to feel _something,_ I didn't stop her."

"So you banged her."

"And your friend, Kiba…well, Hana should consider herself lucky, that she's got a little brother determined to look out for her. He came here looking for her, and they left together. It wasn't pretty. They left just before you got here. It seems that Hana's not the only one who should be grateful for a younger brother who's got his head on straight." He smiles at me and for a split second, I think back to when we were kids, and Itachi was teaching me guitar, and I got the C chord right. He'd smiled like this back then, too. Like he was proud of me.

Weird, how you never forget shit like that. Weird, how many years can pass and how time can change you into someone completely different than who you used to be, and you can fill your head with a thousand, with a _million_ new facts and new memories, but you remember a _feeling._ Something as fleeting and inconsequential as _pride,_ when your big brother smiles at you and tells you 'Good job, Sasuke.'

I never forgot that feeling.

"Go to bed," I order stiffly, standing up from the edge of the mattress and shoving my hands in my pockets. "I'm going home."

Itachi smiles again, in that all-knowing way, before he sighs again and closes his eyes, his way of accepting my departure. But when I reach the door, my hand on the knob about to leave, he says, "You smell like a woman, Sasuke."

* * *

Itachi's sick for most of Christmas Eve. But that's fine, since I use this extra time to finish off a few designs at Ink and Iron.

We're closed for the holidays so there's nobody there but me and Kakashi. He's working on something else – he's got a client coming in who wants a full back tattoo of the four elements, so he's got to come up with something huge and creative and _fast._

I know Itachi doesn't think much of my part-time job. I know he doesn't think much of the tattoos I design, or the way I draw them on myself like some badass. I know he taught me guitar hoping I'd follow in his footsteps. So even if I love doing it – and I do – I sort of have to hide it from him. It's not like I'm scared of his reaction. It's just that I don't see him very often, and when I do, I'd rather not be fighting.

Or, you know. Cleaning him up off a motel room floor. But I can't have it both ways, so I hide the tattooing.

The red couch is more comfortable than my bed, where I usually do my drawing. I don't really have anything in mind for this next piece. I'm just kind of free-drawing, the charcoal staining my fingers; it's not really much of anything, but I like it. Gets my mind off things, this kind of numbing, mindless, aimless, directionless art.

I'm so caught up in it that I don't hear the key turn in the lock at the front door.

"Oh, Sasuke! Um, hey."

Startled, I look up from my sketchpad and there's Sakura, a blush on her face. She's bundled up in her little gray peacoat and a pair of skinny jeans, eyes watery from the wind outside.

"Sakura," I reply, and as soon as I say her name, I'm hit over the back of the head with a thousand memories. The way her skin felt against mine, hot and slick and smooth. The tight, taut muscle of her thighs clenched around my waist. The silk of her hair spilling onto my chest. The room heats up and I force back a blush of my own. "What're you doing here?"

It's Christmas Eve. She shouldn't be here.

"Oh, I thought I left my phone in here," she explains, but I can tell by the nervous way she avoids my eyes that she's lying. With a smirk, I raise my eyebrows at her. She's a terrible liar.

"Okay, fine," she admits with a sigh, not needing me to voice my skepticism out loud. "I knew you'd be here, and after you left last night, I was really worried. About, you know. Your brother, and Kiba's sister, and everything. I don't mean to be nosy or anything, I just…are you okay?"

"You could've texted me that, you know," I tease her, as she sits down next to me, rubbing her gloved hands together to warm them.

"I wanted to make sure _with my eyes_ that everything was all right. You seem okay, though. Are you? How's your brother?"

"Hung over," I say curtly. I look over at her, and I see that under her blush, the rest of her skin is pale. There are bags under her eyes that she's tried to cover with makeup, but the purple rings tell a story of exhaustion that she can't hide. "You're tired, Sakura."

"Didn't sleep well last night," she mumbles, distracted.

""C'mon," I tell her, standing up and motioning for her to do the same. "I'll walk you back."

Sakura chooses to be oblivious to all the dangers an attractive girl wandering around alone at night present, so that leaves me to keep my eye on her. (It's a pretty good excuse, anyway. Sounds solid.) She always argues, though. Always thinks my time is better spent without her.

"You're busy," she protests, with a smile. "I just wanted to make sure you were all right, that's all. You stay here."

"Shut up, Sakura. Let's go."

Without waiting for her tired old feminist "I can take care of myself" rant, I grab one of her tiny gloved hands and pull her up to her feet. She giggles a little and doesn't argue anymore as we leave together. And she doesn't pull her hand away from mine, so I keep it tight.

* * *

"You don't have to leave, you know," Sakura says, her voice sexy, her eyes dark as I stop in front of her door.

It's physically impossible not to respond to that kind of invitation, but hell. It's Christmas Eve and my brother's visiting and as much as I want to stay, I can't.

"I know, I know," she giggles, seeing right through me without me needing to say anything. In a bold move for Sakura, she kisses me quickly on the mouth and draws back with shiny eyes. "Go hang out with your brother. Tell him I say Merry Christmas!"

"Aa," I reply, unable to take my eyes off her lips for some reason.

"And Merry Christmas to you, too, Sasuke," she tells me, blushing as pink as her hair. "I didn't buy you anything, but…I don't know. I just want you to know that I really…I really _appreciate _you."

I can't help the slow smirk that's unfolding as I lean in a little closer, my palms planted on her door, pinning her in place as she stutters and trips over her words. "You _appreciate_ me?" I say, amused.

"Yes. I do. A lot. I wasn't expecting to meet you but now that I have, I'm really glad I did. You're a really…just…"

I don't need her to finish her thought. I read what she's thinking in the flush of her cheeks, the way she stumbles over her words and how she can't quite meet my eyes. And Sakura, since I met her, has been very, _very_ good at getting me to heat up, but this is the first time she's made me feel…_warm._ Not the raging inferno she usually ignites in me that I can recognize and write off as desire, but a warmth that fills me up and makes it hard not to smile.

So I cut her off and kiss her. I didn't buy her anything for Christmas either, but this is all right enough.

* * *

"You know, Sasuke," Itachi says, taking a long drag off his cigarette and blowing the smoke out on the balcony. "I have to say I approve."

"Approve?" I ask, raising my eyebrows when he reaches into his pocket, retrieves a pack of Marlboros, and passes me one. I take it anyway, though. It's snowing on the motel balcony and a smoke keeps you warm as it kills you.

"Of Sakura."

I smirk. Usually this kind of talk would piss me off, but maybe it's the fact that it's twelve minutes to Christmas and a girl just made me feel warm inside. Either way I'm not pissed, just amused.

"Do you."

"Aa. She's very beautiful and very sweet. She could make a suitable companion for you."

"Do you even hear yourself? Do all your _fans_ know Itachi Uchiha's a _romantic?_"

"You can laugh," Itachi smirks back, exhaling a ring of smoke into the snowy night sky. You can barely make out the bruise on his eye in this light from where Kiba decked him. He looks different, younger. At peace with himself, for once. Usually he's working that whole tortured artist angle, and it shows in the undereye bags and the tracks on his arms. Now, though, he looks like he did before he graduated.

Before fame snatched him up and drained all the personality out of him.

"'Sides, I don't remember asking for your approval," I tell him dryly.

"Well, nonetheless, you have it. She's a good girl, Sasuke. Be sure to treat her well. Don't make the same mistakes I did. You never know if you'll have another chance to correct them."

Itachi and I aren't the kind of brothers who have long, heartfelt conversations about significant others, but, uncomfortable as it is, it's kind of unavoidable.

"Look, man," I say, smoking faster just for something to do, since this is so awkward. "If you're…if you want Hana, nothing's stopping you."

"Oh, plenty is stopping me, Sasuke." Itachi smiles, humorlessly, and stubs out his cigarette on the metal railing. "Logic, for one thing; she's a happy woman now in a happy relationship. I have no right to interfere anymore than I already have."

"It doesn't have to be logical," I mutter, thinking of an anorexic dancer who cries too much and smiles too bright. "It doesn't have to make sense."

"So what do _you_ think I should do? Go to her now and tell her that I've loved her since I met her, I was stupid for leaving, and I'd like nothing more than to bring her on the road with me?" He laughs it off like a joke, but it's Christmas. And maybe having a woman would straighten him out.

"Yeah," I tell him.

He's quiet for a few minutes. It's just the two of us there as the minutes roll by and then it's midnight. Christmas. And it's not ideal – he's still got something hard coursing through his bloodstream from his road trip and a shiner on his eye – but it's my big brother and he's home for Christmas and that's all I really wanted.

Then he stands up out of the porch chair and smirks.

"You're a naïve, inexperienced, idealistic little _boy,_" Itachi tells me, and he claps me on the shoulder as I turn my head to glare at him. "You're too reckless to be a proper tattoo artist," he adds, with a disapproving glance at the exposed skin on my forearm showing flame and lightning. "And you don't find any joy in music. You know absolutely nothing about the world beyond this school. And maybe…"

I think I might punch him in the mouth.

"Maybe this time, I should take your advice."

I slow my fist, and sigh, and smirk. Itachi is Itachi. He's overbearing and pushy, judgmental about my life and choices, way too perceptive, and he thinks he knows so much better than me. He's a drug addict and a mess, and he's the most important person in my life. Always has been, always will be.

"I'm getting out of here," I tell him.

"Yes, it's late and it's cold. Mother would kill me for keeping you out this late."

It stings when he mentions Mom, but not like it used to.

"Be careful on your way back, Sasuke. Merry Christmas, little brother."

"You, too," I mumble, and he hugs me, not even minding that I don't hug back. I never do. Sakura's the only one I've touched in any kind of way since Mom died. But I don't throw him off either.

"I'm proud of you, Sasuke," Itachi tells me as I step out of the motel room. The same thing he told me when I was a kid and nailed that first guitar chord.

And it makes me just as happy.

* * *

It's three AM and I'm dead asleep in my dorm room when my phone rings.

It's three AM when the police find my number in Itachi's phone and wake me up on snowy Christmas morning.

I don't register much of what they say. Maybe I'm exhausted, maybe I can't think straight at such an hour, or maybe I hear every single word and just don't _want_ to. Car crash. Icy roads. Alcohol in the car. Needles in the glove compartment.

It's three AM when they tell me my big brother's dead.

* * *

**note..** don't kill me.

xoxo daisy


	13. Effacée

Christmas morning, I don't deviate from my schedule.

I wake up early – trying to ignore the excitement coursing through me about what happened, what _almost _happened last night – and while it's still dark I head over to the gym and I go hard on cardio. Usually I approach my workouts with gusto, but not with enjoyment, but today, and I _know_ it's just residual adrenaline from last night, I'm loving every minute of it.

Sasuke likes me.

And maybe that's idealistic of me to say. I debate that in my head as I up the speed on the treadmill, ponytail flipping back and forth like a pendulum as I pump my arms. See, I debate everything with myself. I'm a classic overthinker.

But in this case, I really feel like maybe there's more to it than he's just trying to fuck me. He spends time with me, doesn't he? And before last night, there wasn't anything sexual about it. I mean, yeah, we almost kissed, but that just could've been a fluke. Two friends of opposite genders in a cold space with emotions running high. Doesn't necessarily have to mean anything.

But no one asked him to ditch his brother and our friends last night and sneak to my dorm. No one asked him to give me a massage that took an immediate nosedive towards intimate.

No one asked him to give me my first kiss, and my second, and countless others after that.

I blush and run even faster like I'm trying to chase down that unbelievable feeling from last night. The tightening in my stomach, the aching between my legs, the desperate way it felt like I was going to fall off the edge of the world. I'd never experienced _anything_ like that before, there simply wasn't anything in my life that I could compare it to.

And now I just want it back.

I look at my face in the enormous wall mirror and to my shock, I'm _smiling._ It's like that breathless kind of smile where you can't quite believe something's happening. Shocked, and incredulous.

And hopeful.

God, for the first time in a long time, I'm hoping for something different. Something better. Something more.

Sasuke likes me. And it's Christmas and he'd said he'd see me today.

* * *

Ino calls me nonstop, and I figure she's just impatient to get started on the present exchange we have scheduled for breakfast. I step out of the shower in the gym, hair damp, check my phone and see six missed calls from her – impatient bitch – so I quick call her back to tell her to hold her horses.

"Merry Christmas, Pig," I say breezily, tossing my running shoes into my gym bag and sliding into a pair of boots. "Wanna meet at-"

"Sakura!" Ino says sharply. Instantly, my attention is caught. She _never_ calls me Sakura. She sounds worried and now I am, too. "Listen, where's Sasuke?"

"I don't know, I haven't seen him since last night…why? Is something wrong?"

"Wait, seriously? You haven't heard yet?"

"Heard what?" All the giddiness I'd been feeling during my workout is long gone, replaced with terror. I grip the phone with both hands. "Ino, what's wrong? What happened?"

She hesitates, then says, "Hurry, get over to the common room. There's something you should see."

Exhaustion be damned, fatigue forgotten, I leave my entire gym bag in the locker room and run like _hell_ back to our dorms.

* * *

When I get there, the common room is unusually crowded, especially for Christmas. Most of the school is at home, visiting family, and those of us who have nowhere else to go usually stick together in small packs to celebrate the holiday. But as soon as I throw open the door, the common room is filled with all the stragglers, everyone watching the news with grim faces.

"Sakura!" Ino calls from the front, and when she says my name, everyone turns to see me, and their expressions are _terrifying._

"What's going on?" I demand, darting through the crowd of people to meet up with Ino.

She just shakes her head sadly and points to the TV.

"…_reporting to you live from downtown Konoha,"_ says a stern-faced reporter, bundled up against the Christmas snow, and I recognize the landmarks behind her. Close to KPAA. My stomach clenches and all I can think of is Sasuke. "_Authorities responded at 2:55 this morning to a car crash off Main Street._"

Car crash?

I'm vaguely aware that Ino's hand is wrapped tightly around mine.

"…_the deceased has been confirmed as 21-year-old Itachi Uchiha, lead guitarist of internationally-known rock band Akatsuki. Sources say that alcohol and narcotics were found in the car and it is believed that Uchiha was under the influence when he was driving the rental early this morning. Official reports will be delivered when an autopsy is performed. No other drivers were harmed in the crash, which has been ruled an accident._

"_Uchiha's death is widely felt among the music community. A graduate of Konoha Performing Arts Academy, he is believed to have been visiting the town of his origin to spend time with his younger brother, a current student. Uchiha is survived by seventeen-year-old Sasuke, who could not be reached for comment. More on this tragic Christmas story coming up later, stay tuned to Channel 8, coming to you live from downtown Konoha."_

Itachi.

_Itachi?!_

"He's dead?" I whisper hollowly, and there are tears in my eyes I don't remember.

"They found him this morning," Ino says gently, rubbing my shoulder, and I realize that everyone in the room is staring at me.

Itachi's famous, everybody knows of him, and he's a legend here at KPAA, so everyone's affected by his death. But none more so than Sasuke himself, I know that. I know he's gonna be destroyed by this. Itachi's all he has left in the world.

I have to find him.

"I have to find Sasuke," I hear myself choke out.

"He's not answering his phone," Ino tells me, worried. "I thought maybe he might've been with you."

"He…he was, last night," I whisper. "But he left early…said that there was a, um, a fight, that Kiba went down to his motel, something about his sister…"

I know I'm not making any sense but that doesn't matter, I have to piece together what happened last night so I can find Sasuke. He can't be alone right now, he needs somebody, and I don't know if I have any right, any claim to him, but all I know is I have to make sure he's okay.

"Where's Naruto?" I ask worriedly.

"He's in Kusa, visiting Hinata and her family," Ino says. "We called him as soon as we found out, though, and he's on his way back. But nobody's seen Sasuke. They brought Itachi to the morgue at the hospital and he apparently identified the body last night but after that, he took off. I was hoping he was with you."

"I have to find him," I say. And I feel myself steel over the way I do before a competition. Narrow-minded, entirely focused on one thing. Normally it's such a detriment, the way I zone out of the universe and concentrate on something singular, but now it's coming into play in a positive way. I don't care about the crowd of people staring, speculating now about Type A, solitary Sakura Haruno and her surprising concern for badass, much-admired Sasuke Uchiha, or the fact that I as good as confirmed that something was happening between us last night.

Nothing matters. Not Christmas, not gossip, not the way my hair's damp and starting to freeze over in the cold. All that matters is Sasuke.

"Ino, call me as soon as Naruto gets here," I demand. "I don't know if I'll be able to reach him right now but I have to try, at least until Naruto's back."

"Do you think you know where he is?"

"I don't know. I don't know but I have to find him. He can't be alone right now. Just…just call me, okay?"

"Okay," she says with a firm nod, and as I take off out the door like I'm on fire, I hear her snap at everyone else in the room. "What're all _you_ looking at? Nothing to see there!"

See, because I can zero in on one thing at a time, it's easy for me to tune out things like fear and fatigue. I haven't given myself any time to consider how Sasuke will react to seeing me if I can find him – in his grief, I'm sure he won't be happy – but I'll cross that bridge when I come to it.

Instead, I race over to his dorms, slipping on the snow in my boots, and as I cut the corner, I'm stunned to see a crowd gathered outside the building. Most of them are holding microphones and cameras, and to my shock, I realize that they're _reporters._

I recognize some of the vans parked illegally in the grass, too. Huge music magazines, national newspapers, tabloids, _Entertainment Weekly._ Itachi's only been dead for six hours and already everyone in the universe is trying to get a piece of the story. I feel my stomach turn, sickened by the display before me, and then I'm _pissed._

_They're trying to get a comment from Sasuke,_ I realize, _furious_. _His brother's just been killed, he's just had to identify the body at the morgue, and they're waiting outside his dorm like fucking scavengers to get a quote. Unbelievable. Unfuckingbelievable._

"There she is!" I hear one of them shout, and I'm confused for a moment before I realize they're talking about _me._ In a flash, I'm surrounded by a dozen-odd reporters, microphones shoved in my face, news cameras rolling, and I'm stunned by the attention for a second.

"You're Sakura Haruno, correct?" an aggressive magazine columnist demands brusquely. "Sources say that you spent time with Itachi Uchiha last night prior to his death. Do you have a comment for that?"

_They know we all hung out last night? These assholes certainly do their jobs._

"Yeah, _fuck off,_" I hiss at the camera, my gutterbutt upbringing coming through in my anger and frustration. "Get out of my way."

But nobody moves, except to get closer.

"We have several witnesses saying they saw Itachi Uchiha kiss you last night, do you confirm?"

I remember he kissed my hand last night, and I can't believe they'd twist that into something more significant.

"Other witnesses claim to have seen his brother enter your dorm last night and stay for some time," another reporter tells me. "Are you currently dating Sasuke Uchiha?"

"You want a comment?"I ask suddenly, clenching my hands into fists, and I swear if they get closer to me, I'm gonna punch somebody. "Here's your comment. You're all _revolting._ You congregate here hours after a 21-year-old boy is killed, and hound his brother trying to get a quote so you can sell your fucking magazines. You should all be ashamed of yourselves but you're not, so do me a favor and step the _fuck_ out of my way before I call the _police._"

I take advantage of everyone's shock and stomp through the crowd; with a quick flash of my student ID card, I unlock the door and slam it shut behind me.

I've only been to Sasuke's room a handful of times and never to stay, but I remember it's on the second floor. I race up the stairs and down the hallway, and I see his last name emblazoned on the door at the very end.

"Sasuke!" I cry out, knocking urgently on the door. "Sasuke, it's Sakura! Are you in there?"

Nothing. Silence.

"Sasuke, open up if you're there, it's just me! Sasuke!"

Still nothing. I try the handle and it's not locked; terrified, I open the door.

He's not here. His bed is neatly made, his guitar is propped up against the wall and his textbooks and homework are all in order on his desk. The room is cold, which means he hasn't been here to heat it for at least a few hours.

_Where are you?_ I think, getting more and more frightened. _Sasuke, please be all right!_

* * *

I slip out the back exit so I don't run into the reporters again, and this time, I take off for the student recording studio on the Music Quad.

I'm almost never there, since my program's on the Dance Quad; sometimes Miss Suzume has us meet with the student musicians if we're doing an instrument-heavy piece, but more often than not, we stick to our own section. So I don't really know M-Quad too well, but I remember Sasuke telling me once that his studio has a great view of the Nakano River, and there's only Studio F that fits that description.

The river's completely frozen and the snow won't let up, so I slip and slide across the little red bridge and swipe myself into Studio F. Shaking snow from my hair and out of my eyes, I look down the hallways, left and right, close to panicking now because I don't know where the hell he'd be. In desperation, I shout out, "SASUKE!"

No answer, but I was never expecting one in the first place.

I pick a corridor and run like hell, kicking open doors like a crazy person. But nobody's here, not on Christmas, and each session room is empty except for some forgotten instruments. All the recording equipment is turned off. It's eerily silent.

Every room, devoid of life.

There's a painful stitch in my side and I realize that I'm crying. Because what if I can't find Sasuke? What if he's not here? What if he's hurt or something? Or what if he _left?_

All the exhaustion I'd been ignoring on this wild goose chase comes crashing back, and I hit the floor on my knees, arms wrapped around my stomach. I'm soaking wet and freezing cold and now I'm crying, crying because I can't find Sasuke, crying because I know, I _know_ this is going to destroy him, and the most I can hope for is be there to hold his hand.

I can't even _imagine_ what he's going through. I can't, and I desperately, _desperately_ want to help him, but I don't know how. I'm maybe overestimating my value to him, to think that he might even want me around while he's going through this, but shit, I don't know any other way to help him than to just be _there_ for him.

"SAKURA!" I hear a masculine voice shout from behind me, and my eyes go wide. _Really? He's here? Oh thank God…_

I turn around, though, and it's not Sasuke. It's the next best thing.

"_Naruto!_" I choke out, seeing his wide blue eyes and snow-saturated blonde hair and feeling just a little bit more optimistic. Naruto skids to a halt when he sees me, surprised, maybe, to see me kneeling on the floor having a minor breakdown. Then he rushes me like a linebacker and swoops me up into a hug.

"I saw it on the news this morning," he tells me, crushing me in against him, like _I'm_ the one who needs to be comforted. "Ino called me and told me you guys couldn't find him. I was already on my way back."

"Naruto," I sob, yanking him to me tight enough to strangle. He's so warm and his presence is so reassuring that I automatically feel better about this situation. Because if Naruto is here, that means it's going to be okay. Because I may not be enough for Sasuke, but Naruto's his best friend, and he can get through to him where I can't. "I've been looking _everywhere,_ all morning. He's not at the gym, he's not in his dorm, he's not here, he's not _anywhere_ on campus, and he won't answer his phone, and there are _reporters_ looking for him, and…and he can't be alone right now, Naruto! Who knows what he'll do!"

"We'll find him, Sakura," he tells me, his voice so full of marrow-deep confidence that it's impossible not to trust him. He strokes my hair in comfort and I bury my face in his shoulder for another three seconds of emotional fragility before I pull back, determined.

"He wouldn't wanna be here," Naruto says, thinking hard. "Not around the music scene today, not with all that bullshit happening outside."

It hits me like a bolt of lightning, and I shake Naruto's shoulders.

"Of course he won't wanna be here! I know where he is!"

It's so obvious, I can't believe I didn't think of it before. Sasuke's only outlet is his art. His music is something he does because he's expected to, and he does it well, but he only ever really, truly invests himself in his art. It's the biggest part of his heart, next to Itachi, and…

"He's at _Kakashi's,_" Naruto exclaims. "Shit, Sakura, we gotta get over there!"

We take one more look at each other, and then we fly.

* * *

I don't know what I'm prepared for when I throw open the front door to Kakashi's. I don't know what I'm prepared for when I run inside with Naruto, letting in the freezing cold Christmas wind behind us.

But it isn't what I find.

Sasuke's there, just like I thought he would be. He's in the lobby where we spend so much time together, sitting on the floor with his back against the wall. It's much too cold for what he's wearing, just a black T-shirt and jeans, no jacket. And he doesn't react when we run inside, doesn't look up from the carpet.

"Sasuke," I choke out, suddenly aware of the stitch in my side. Overcome with relief, all the tiredness finally sets in, but none of that matters because I found him. "_Sasuke._"

What do you say, to someone who's just lost everything?

What do you say to the strongest, calmest, most capable person you know at a time like this? To your hero, when he's lost his hero? As if you could ever relate to him? As if you could possibly understand what he's going through?

I drop to my knees in front of him, one arm wrapped around my stomach, and when I whisper his name again, he looks up at me.

I'm struck by the dead look in his eyes. Sasuke never really shows much emotion, never really strays from a default mode of complete apathy, but there's always so much _intensity_ in his eyes. When he's angry, when he's stressed, when he's annoyed, when he's content, you can read it in silver and black but now, there's just _nothing._ Like his grief goes _beyond_ any emotion you might be able to see for yourself, like it's soul-deep, and even if I can't empathize with it, I feel it straight in my heart.

"We heard this morning," I manage, and Sasuke's face suddenly blurs over and I realize, belatedly, that I'm crying.

"You okay, man?" Naruto asks from behind me, but Sasuke doesn't move.

Just stares at me like he can't even see me, perfect vision and all.

"It's gonna be all right," Naruto continues, and I hear him choke on his words, and he's crying, too. He drops down with us and claps a hand on Sasuke's shoulder. "It'll all be okay, man, I promise. You have us, and…"

"_Okay?_" Sasuke echoes, and if I'm startled by his empty eyes, I'm disturbed by his frigid voice. Then, inexplicably, his lips pull back into a sneer, and he lets out a humorless laugh that makes me want to run away. "_You think anything is gonna be OKAY?_"

"Sasuke," I whisper shakily, breathing heavily. "We're here for you. I'm so, _so_ sorry this happened."

As soon as I say the words, I wish I could take them back. What a shallow, meaningless, trite thing to offer to someone who deserves so much more. _So sorry for your loss._

Sasuke laughs again and smacks Naruto's hand away from his shoulder. "Get out of here," he says darkly. "Both of you. Leave me alone."

There's no warmth in him. There's nothing there, it's like the Sasuke I've come to know and like and admire is just _gone._ And it breaks my _heart_ to know that this is how badly he's hurting, and that I can't do anything to help him.

_No,_ I tell myself harshly, steeling myself to face Sasuke's temper and his ice. _No. He needs me right now. I don't know how I know that but he needs me, no matter what he says. I can't leave him._

I take his hand gently, slowly, like approaching a wounded animal, and he snarls at me but doesn't smack me away like he did Naruto.

"If I could change this I would," I tell him, tears running fast and furious from my eyes. "Sasuke I know it isn't enough and I know I can't understand how this feels for you, but I _swear_ I'd take away your pain if I could."

"What do _you_ know about it?" he snaps, his words slicing through the quiet of the tattoo parlor like the crack of a whip. "What do _you_ know about _anything?_ You come in here like you can do _anything_ for me, like you understand what this is like, you can't even fix _yourself._"

"Sasuke," Naruto says sharply, a warning note in his voice, but Sasuke ignores him. He pins me with a glare so relentless, so full of loathing, that the tears freeze in my eyes. I get the impression that he'd have his hands around my throat if he thought he could get away with it, and my heart isn't breaking, it's _shattered._

"You're the biggest mess out of all of us," Sasuke tells me, voice _dripping_ with disdain, like I'm the most disgusting thing he's ever had the misfortune of coming across. "Committed to this disaster of a life and you think your commitment makes you strong, well, it _doesn't._ You're _pathetic._ You're _weak._ You're…"

I cut him off.

If he had said these words to me any other day, I would have slapped him, turned on my heel, and walked away, never to speak to him again. If he had looked at me with such hatred on any other day, I would have left him where he sat without so much as a thought. I would have internalized his words, reveled in his condemnation, let it consume me like all the negative criticism I've ever gotten, to the tenth power.

But not today.

Even though it hurts, even though it cuts me right to the core, I wrap my arms around his neck and pull him close.

He stiffens. He _struggles._ There's no comparing this angry, bitter, broken boy to the intense, passionate man kissing the breath out of me the night before, but all of that feels so far _away._ So blisteringly unimportant now that Sasuke's suffering the way he is; that I could ever have put any stock in what happened the night before is almost laughable, when compared to this nightmare at Ink and Iron.

But those who deserve love least need it most, and in this moment, I fall completely in love with Sasuke Uchiha.

In love with his heart and his strength, his soul and his weakness. In love with not only the idea of him, his potential, but with who he is. Good and bad. Kind and cruel. He's hit his rock bottom and here, when he's miles away from the much-adored guitarist, the campus hero and heartthrob, here when he spits venom and lashes out and _hurts,_ here is where I fall in love with him.

And God it doesn't _matter,_ but I hold him like it does. I tighten my grip around him when he tries to pull back, and I bury my nose into his neck and let my tears soak into the collar of his shirt. And his skin is cold against the side of my face and he snarls, "Get off me," in my ear, but I register the panic in his voice. Like he's about to come apart.

Then I feel warm arms embrace both of us and they belong to Naruto, Naruto who hugs us all together in a tangle of limbs and tears while Sasuke remains numb and unresponsive. And it takes five seconds before I hear Sasuke murmur, mostly to himself, "He's…_gone._"

I can't accept Sasuke's pain as my own, because I'll never know what it's like to lose my big brother; I never had one to begin with. Neither has Naruto. And I know that Itachi meant more to Sasuke than anybody else in the world, that he looked up to him and admired him and loved him and craved his approval, so to have all that taken away in one night – on _Christmas_ – is something that I just can't relate to. Can't empathize with.

But God I love Sasuke and I can't let him suffer alone, so I'll sit here with him on Christmas. I'll hold him close to me and cry because he can't, cry for him and what he's lost, with Naruto who holds us both and cries right along with me, because he's Sasuke's brother, too. And it'll snow outside and they'll sing Christmas carols and open presents in front of a fire, but my family's here, at Ink and Iron, blind and deaf to the joys of Christmas in the face of this horror.

And there's nowhere I'd rather be, than right here with them.

* * *

There are three missed calls from Miss Suzume demanding to know where I am, why I'm skipping out on the mandatory Christmas evening practice, who do I think I am, the usual.

(She's never been easier to ignore.)

* * *

**note..** thank you so much for the huge response to the last chapter. maybe i'll kill off some more characters, get some more reviews? j/k. MAYBE.

anyway, one of the things that always kind of pissed me off about the manga is how people are frustrated with sakura's inability to understand sasuke. of course she can't understand him, he can't even understand himself, nor could he understand her, either; what's important is that even if she couldn't directly relate to his experiences, she still wanted to be there with him to help him through them. that's what the most important thing in a friendship or relationship is: a willingness to stick around and work through shit. that's love. make sense? to any sasuke/sakura naysayers out there: calm yo ass down. it's canon. it's going to happen.

leave some love, y'all. peace out, girl scouts.

xoxo daisy :)


	14. Ink

Solace in the bottom of a bottle.

I smirk as the last of the bourbon slides down my throat, much smoother now that I'm completely wasted.

Doesn't get much more rock and roll than that.

* * *

Kisame is the bassist in Akatsuki.

He was Itachi's best friend, before.

It's Kisame who stumbles inside the tattoo shop that night, when I'm sitting on the floor with Naruto next to me and Sakura curled up between both of us, her little hand tight on my wrist. I don't know how he knew where to look, but he comes in looking ashen, eyes bloodshot.

I forgot that I wouldn't be the only one ripped apart by what happened last night.

"Kisame," I say, and Naruto and Sakura look up at the unexpected visitor.

"You're the bassist in Akatsuki," says Naruto, eyes wide, tone hollow. "_Dude._"

Of all the times to be starstruck. Kisame doesn't even look at Naruto, his eyes stay on me, expression grim, jaw set. I feel Sakura's grip on my wrist tighten.

"What do you want," I mutter.

"The band wants to see you, Sasuke," he tells me quietly. "About Itachi."

"What do I care about the _band._"

As if Akatsuki means _anything_ to me now. As if I could care less what _they're_ going through. His bandmates. The people who plied him full of drugs and liquor for the last four years, who made him forget who he was, who, along with this shitty ass school, helped _create_ the _disaster_ that Itachi Uchiha became. What makes _Kisame_ think I care one _speck_ what happens to Akatsuki, now that Itachi's gone?

"We came as soon as we found out," Kisame goes on, and it's not like him to be so subdued. Usually he's a fucking nutcase; maybe he feels some kind of culpability, for what Itachi became. For the hand he had in it. I see the telltale crosshatch markings on Kisame's bare arm and know that Itachi wasn't shooting up all by himself. "Bunch of us are over at the Bourbon House downtown."

The Bourbon House is where Itachi and Akatsuki had their first gig. I was a kid at the time and I remember looking at my brother onstage, back when he _loved_ the guitar and you could read it all over his body. I remember thinking that he could move the moon and stars if he wanted to. It was that kind of bone-deep idolatry when your big brother is your hero and nothing he does could ever be wrong, just because it's _him._ I remember going home that night and practicing my own shitty guitar till my fingers bled, because I wanted to be him.

Now, I'd give anything just to have him here.

"I have nothing to say to you," I say levelly, "and you have nothing I'm interested in hearing. The funeral's next week. Till then get the fuck out of here."

"I know you think that we're what killed your brother," Kisame says hotly, losing his temper at last. Good. I welcome it, I fucking welcome it, some real adversity. Conflict, since Naruto and Sakura only seem interested in holding me together, when all I want to do is fall apart. My muscles flex and I stand up, shaking Sakura off me.

"You are," I snarl, losing that dead, empty apathy I haven't been able to break through since I found out. "You and Sasori and Kakuzu and everyone else in that fucking _band._ _You_ killed him."

And oh _Christ_ does it feel good to accuse him. To put blame on someone else, anyone besides me, or Itachi. Because if it's someone else's fault, then I can enact justice. Vengeance. Punishment. I'm itching, _dying_ to knock the sharpened teeth from Kisame's mouth.

"Itachi's death was an _accident,_ Sasuke," Kisame argues. "A car accident. Slipped on the fuckin' ice. It's not fair, but that's the truth and you'll have to face it sometime. In the meantime…we're all waiting for you. We just have something we want to ask you and then after that, we'll leave you alone."

"He _just_ found out," Sakura snaps, and she's on her feet, too, eyes narrowed at Kisame. The fact that he's an international superstar doesn't seem to faze her in the slightest, and Kisame looks at her with his eyebrows raised, like he can't quite make out why she's there. "About his brother. He's in no position to talk to _you all_ about _anything, _and…"

"Sakura."

I say her name and she stops midrant; touching as it is that she and Naruto want to stick up for me so badly, it's abrasive. She needs to keep her mouth shut about things she doesn't understand.

"C'mon, kid," Kisame sighs. "We only need an hour."

An hour. That's how long I have to hear out what this asshole and the rest of those assholes want. It doesn't seem like a big deal at the time, honestly, but you'd never know it looking at Naruto and Sakura. Both of them look terrified, wide-eyed and anxious as they exchange not-so-furtive glances of concern.

I don't fucking need that. I don't need that shit. I don't need them to coddle me and be worried about me like I can't handle myself. It pisses me off more than anything.

But when I leave with Kisame, when I see their faces reflected in the plexiglass door, both of them standing together in the only place in Konoha where I feel really, truly at home, I get this feeling, and I can't really describe it, but it's there. This feeling that I'm walking away from exactly where I need to be.

* * *

I'm drunk. Hammered, actually. And alcohol's a depressant but fuck it, because my brother's dead so now I'm depressed.

At least the edges are starting to blur a little. And everything's going numb, which is fine, since numb isn't agony.

Itachi's manager, Orochimaru, is seated at the table directly across from me, and he watches me, eyes cold and calculating, as I pound back glass after glass, ignoring my company and determined to drink until I can't feel anything anymore. He's a slimy, oily guy, the epitome of a skeevy band manager, but his results are proven: Akatsuki's one of the most famous, most successful bands in the _world._

At least, they were. Before their lead guitarist decided to throw his lot in with love and got himself killed.

He was going to visit Hana, I know. Maybe I'm the only one in the world who does, including her. And maybe that's not fair, to anyone. Because Itachi should be remembered by his final act: throwing away his mistakes, turning back on his guilt and his regret and trying to make things right with the girl he'd always loved. In the end, that's who he was.

Now, she'll never know how he would have changed for her, how he'd already started. Now, she'll remember him as the guy who broke her heart, then came back to interfere in her relationship years later. His intentions won't matter because nobody but me knows they even _existed._

And it's so ironic, so bitterly, laughably, tragically ironic that I take another shot. Because _fuck_ this world and _fuck_ this industry. Fuck what it does to people, how it draws them in with magic words like 'music' and 'fame' and 'fortune,' only to cut them down like a falling star. The alcohol sears but it's one step closer to oblivion, which is what I'm gunning for.

"It had to have been a shock," Orochimaru says after awhile.

I scoff. Don't dignify that with an answer. 'Shock'. I'm not shocked he died; I'm shocked it wasn't the drugs that killed him.

A car accident. On the way to tell the girl he loved that he loved her. It's the _opposite_ of rock and roll. I smirk into my empty shotglass and wave the bartender over to replace it.

"I'm sure you can see how this puts Akatsuki in a difficult position," Orochimaru continues, drumming his painted black fingernails on the table like this isn't the _worst possible time._ "Itachi was our lead guitarist since we put the band together five years ago. His skill is relatively unmatched, and he will be very difficult to replace."

"That why you called me here?" I sneer, looking around at the other members strewn around the empty bar. "To tell me you can't find someone to take his place? Little _soon,_ ain't it?"

My drunkenness and my rage make me sarcastic. I'm two seconds from punching someone in the mouth. Did they really call me here to discuss _how they're going to replace Itachi?_ He hasn't even been dead for a full day yet and already, that's all they care about. Filling his spot like nothing's wrong.

"On the contrary, Sasuke," Orochimaru says easily. "We believe we've found the replacement we're looking for, and Itachi selected the man himself."

"Did he."

"Itachi knew, in the last few months of his life, that his death was inevitable. Like you, we thought it would be the drugs that killed him – he was in way too deep for way too long – but this…none of us saw _this_ coming." He slides the morning newspaper at me. The one that decrees Itachi Uchiha's death in a car accident in bold black lettering.

"He also believed that his career with the band was coming to a close," Orochimaru goes on, and this is news to me.

"Itachi said he wanted to quit?" I ask, wishing I hadn't had quite so much to drink, because now I'm curious. He'd never said anything to me about that, and quitting the band that made him famous is kind of a big deal.

"In so many words," Orochimaru continues, taking a sip from his G&T. "And – if you'll allow me to cut right to the chase – he believed that _you_ would be the one best suited to replace him."

A beat of silence.

"I know this might come as a shock, considering what you've just been through. But Itachi always thought very highly of you both as a man and as a musician; he kept tabs on you while he was on tour, communicated with your teachers at KPAA, and received glowing reports. He submitted to me an unofficial audition tape, taken from one of your gigs with your practice bandmates last year."

_What?!_ I can't _believe_ what I'm hearing. To my knowledge, Itachi never cared what I was doing at school as long as I didn't knock up any girls. But to hear that he was checking up on me – that he was making contingency plans for me that involved me _taking his spot_ in Akatsuki – feels like something out of a movie.

Did he know, then? That his time was running out? That whether it be from an overdose that would have surprised no one, or a simple skid on a patch of ice Christmas Eve, he didn't have very long, and he'd have to settle his affairs?

The only two he ever had: me and Akatsuki.

And I am _revolted._

"You're kidding me, right," I snarl, glaring at Orochimaru and more than ready to kick his ass. "You want _me_ to join_ Akatsuki._ You want me to replace my own brother who isn't. Even. _Buried yet._"

"These were your brother's wishes, Sasuke," says Orochimaru. "Whether he planned on leaving the band willingly, or…whatever the case may be, Itachi was hard at work while he was alive making plans for your future. I can understand that the idea might seem…unsavory, so soon after the news has broken. We accept that you will need time to grieve. We all will. Itachi's death is a deep loss to the music industry he loved so much."

"He didn't love it," I bite out furiously, because why won't any of them _get it?_ "He _hated it._ He wasn't shooting up and going blackout because it was _fun._ He was trying to _forget._ He was addicted and he was fucked up and you all _knew it_ and let it _continue._ Itachi lost his passion years ago, accept it and get the fuck out of here!"

Orochimaru sighs and sets his empty glass, still chilled from the ice, back down on the table. He fishes a few bills from his wallet and sets them neatly beside the glass. More than enough to cover his tab, and mine.

"I can see we're not getting anywhere with this just yet," he says with a fettered kind of disappointment. Like he can't register the finality in my refusal. Like he's expecting my answer to change. "I admit I'm disappointed in your aversion to this idea, but I also concede that it was a bit insensitive of me to spring this on you all at once. Do yourself a favor, and take a few days to think this over. If you change your mind…"

A business card materializes out of nowhere. He slides it into my hand; through a drunken haze, I make out his contact information.

"Give us a call," he finishes.

It's snowing outside, still. Not the kind that sticks.

* * *

I go back to my dorm after a few more shots at the bar. I'm drunk as hell and numb as hell and I can't believe it's still fucking Christmas. I only know it's nighttime because the streetlamps are on.

I kind of forget Naruto and Sakura, probably still waiting for me at Kakashi's. I tell myself I don't care if they wait there all night, because they're both on my fucking nerves anyway. Trying to insinuate themselves in my business, sticking their noses where they don't belong, as if either of them could even _begin_ to process what I'm going through right now.

(And I know they're only trying to help, which makes it worse.)

So now I'm guilty on top of that, and I tell myself it's just a mistake that I walk right past Ink and Iron, stumble down the streets back to campus.

The reporters are gone. And that's good, because if anyone had tried to shove a camera in my face right now, I know I'd be going to jail. I'm not sober enough to restrain myself and even if I was, I don't think I would. I didn't get to fight Kisame or any of the other members of Akatsuki, so I'm still full of all this unreleased fury.

What I wouldn't give to run into Zaku harassing Sakura right now. I picture the bloody smear he'd leave on the snow and it soothes my anger for the briefest of seconds before it returns full-force.

I'm too wired right now. Too drunk to make sense of my actions and too drunk to care. It feels like a live wire in my head, like an electrocution. Forcing energy where it doesn't belong, and I just want to fucking hit something. I want to fucking move. I want to fucking _destroy._

"S-Sasuke."

I hear my name as I stalk down the hallway towards my room, and freeze. It takes me a second to register her presence but then there she is.

Sakura's standing outside my door, biting her lip as she looks up at me with her wide, worried eyes.

"Get out of here," I growl, and bizarrely, I think of those old black-and-white monster movies Itachi and I used to watch when we were kids. Where the hero turns into this bloodthirsty werewolf beast in bad graphics, and attacks the female lead. I remember the scream, and that freaks me the fuck out, because I'm jumped up and drunk right now, but I'd rather stick a gun in my mouth than hurt Sakura.

(Physically. I'm really good at tearing her down with words.)

"No," she says shakily, but bravely, and she squares her shoulders. "Sasuke, I…I don't think you should be alone right now."

"What makes you think I care what you think?" I snarl. I'll cut her with my words, get her out of here, away from me and all this _anger_ she doesn't deserve to bear. I'll slice her open with words I don't mean so she has the sense to leave me alone right now. She can't handle this. No one can. She has to leave.

"That won't work this time," she snaps, eyes flashing with some fucking anger of her own. "Please, Sasuke. I think…I don't want to leave you alone. I want to stay with you. You're…you're drunk, and…"

My fist comes down on the door beside her head, and the loud noise makes her flinch. I glare at her with dizzy eyes, her face sliding in and out of focus. She looks appropriately frightened, I guess, considering I almost put a hole through thick cedar about three inches from her face. But still, she doesn't move away.

"_Sakura._ You have _no idea_ what I need right now. Get out of here. Quit trying to _understand_ me. You're a…"

Whatever I was gonna say, though, is stifled, because there's a flash of movement and I register Sakura's hands in my hair, her lips suddenly an inch from mine. Her eyes are narrowed and I stiffen.

"You feel like you're about to split apart from your body," she breathes against my mouth. It sounds morbidly seductive, and my fists clench as I try and fight this new shock of unexpected arousal. "You feel like there's no drug in the world strong enough to take the edge off how you're feeling, and there's so much _anger_ and you feel so _guilty_ that all you want to do is fucking feel something that isn't _pain._"

My eyes widen a little bit. Because all of that makes sense. And it comes from the least likely source: a stupid, inconsequential fairy princess who should have no idea why I am the way I am, except that she does.

"I can give you that, Sasuke," she whispers, and if I have any doubts, even through my drunkenness, about her intentions, she extinguishes them with a subtle roll of her hips against mine. All the air in my lungs rushes out in some almost-painful evacuation.

"I'm drunk," I remind her, even as I kiss her, a bruising, relentless kiss that might have hurt a less delicate girl. "I'm fucked up, Sakura." Another kiss and she tastes like whiskey and an elusive silver lining. Her hands tug my hair so I slam her up against my door; if anyone sees us in the hallway, we're both fucked, but she doesn't seem to care, and I'm too drunk to. "This ain't the right time."

"I can take it away for a little while," she promises, sliding her tongue across the seam of my lips. I don't think I've ever been this aroused this quickly before, and the circumstances are so fucking morbid I can't help but feel _guilty._ My brother's been dead for 24 hours. This isn't how I'd expected to cope.

But I'm in no position to turn away catharsis. This isn't the way I wanted it to happen but I've wanted her for months so that makes it okay. I'm drunk and violent but my brother's dead, and if she wants me to take it all out on her, then fine. I'm not forcing her. This is her choice. _Our_ choice.

She's gonna let me fuck her to help me feel better.

There'll be time tomorrow, to contemplate on exactly how fucked up we both are. There'll be time between the vomiting, before the hangover abates and while the guilt's fresh, to reflect on what a fucking cock-up of human connection this is. How I took the virginity of KPAA's golden girl the night my brother was killed, how she offered it to me when I was drunk and unable to think straight. How she knew exactly what I needed, regardless of how unthinkable thing it is to demand from someone.

It's a bastardization of love. A corruption of our bond, a betrayal of every tenet of connectivity, and we both know it, and neither of us care. I love her, I realize, in this horrible, beautiful moment, when I rip open the door, push her inside, slam it behind us, that I fucking love her. I love her the wrong way and I can tell by the heated look in her eyes that she must fucking love me, too, because of everything she's sacrificing for me, just so I can feel something _else._

We're both in love, I know it sure as shit, but we're both too cynical for that to matter enough right now to stop. What should be a glorious revelation is nothing more than bitter acrimony, because love is only going to complicate things, and we're too complicated as it is.

Still, though, it doesn't matter. I'm drunk and I'm grieving and I'm angry and I don't. Fucking. Care. I throw her on that bed and she wraps her legs around my hips and then she's _mine._ For hours, she's _mine_ and just like she promised, I don't think of Itachi. I don't think of Orochimaru, or Akatsuki, or Naruto or the reporters or the funeral arrangements.

I think of Sakura. I think of her warmth and her warped love. I focus on the way my vision sharpens to pinpricks when she slides on top. I focus on the way my breathing picks up and my heartrate picks up and so does hers. I concentrate on the way she bites her bottom lip hard enough to bleed when I find a spot she likes.

She keeps her promise. I forget everything but her.

* * *

**note..** thanks for the birthday wishes, the continual support, and the tolerance of my temper :) PHILLIES WIN.

xoxo daisy :)


	15. Releve'

You know when I was young, I used to have this really big thing for movies.

It's something that _completely _fell by the wayside, one of the many distractions I used to enjoy that had to take a backseat to dance. I mean, you know. Besides the occasional musical I'd watch here and there, purely for research. You'd be surprised at how many moves in a dance routine are just recycled from musicals.

But, like any other little girl, I used to fall in love with the lead actor for a good two hours. And Ino and I used to compare ideal men. She was always really into the sensitive, Disney prince type. The kind that swept the princess off her feet with some unbelievable proclamation of love (even though most Disney princes meet the princess and marry her basically the next day), and carried her off on horseback to some shining castle to live happily ever after.

I was always more into the buff action hero. The one who had a rigid sense of right and wrong, and wasn't afraid to bend the rules to get shit done. The _badass _who could get his hands dirty, and who spoke a few words and banged a hot heroine. And me and Ino would fight _all the time_ about which one was better: the fairy tale prince or the law-breaking gunslinger.

At Itachi's funeral, I look over at Sasuke, one of the pallbearers taking a shining black casket to a freshly-dug grave, and I realize that he's a little bit of both.

There's something strange, and beautiful, and _miserable_ about realizing that your movie star crushes are real and flesh and blood.

* * *

It's a media circus outside the cemetery, but local zoning laws say they can't come within a 300-foot radius of the funeral party. It's impossible to tune them out even from 300 yards away. I know Sasuke's got to hate this, but the most I can do is sit here, quietly, with Naruto and pay my respects.

I didn't know Itachi. Not very well, anyway, besides a bit of polite conversation. And yeah, of course, he's famous and everything, but having spoken to him myself – having known his brother as well as I do – it's not the same kind of morbid, detached fascination an ordinary person has when a celebrity dies. There's something personal to it, because this isn't just some too-famous, drug-addicted rock god spiraling out of control in the prime of his youth.

This is the brother of _Sasuke._ And I can't…I don't know. I can't really define what he means to me, or why it matters so much. Or maybe I _can,_ and that's the fucking _problem._

I sit in a hard-backed plastic chair wearing a black dress and a black coat and I keep my eyes on Sasuke, standing with Itachi's bandmates surrounding the grave. I sit between Naruto and Kakashi, who apparently was great, great friends with Itachi when he was alive; he's given everyone the week off at Ink and Iron to properly mourn. The priest is giving the burial rites and no one's really listening; there are tears in the small seated crowd and the occasional sniffle, the rustle of someone slipping a handkerchief to the person next to them. From my position in the back, all I can make out is Sasuke's profile, but he looks just…

He's wearing a black suit, tall and angular and muscular, as unbelievably handsome as a Disney prince. But there in his expression is ice and steel, and underneath his jacket are tattoos that streak up his arms and he's as wounded as an action hero. Surviving because he doesn't know how to quit, even when he should.

A mess of contradictions, Sasuke is. And I'm a mess _period,_ because in this minute, right here, in a sunny cemetery on New Years' Eve, at the worst moment of his life, I realize that I fucking love him.

And the kind of _wrong_, _absurd, improbable_ love you only ever see in a Disney movie. The kind that is a surprise to no one except the uptight, sheltered, anorexic princess who doesn't realize she's falling for someone until she's already hit rock bottom. But that's the wrong comparison, too, because I'm pretty sure Jasmine never fucked Aladdin the night his brother died (and every night since), only to realize a full week later it was because she _loved him_ that she compromised herself.

There's a slight pressure on my knee and I start, look over, and see Naruto, watching me with genuine, brotherly concern in his loopy blue eyes.

"It's gonna be okay," he tells me, and it's then that I notice that I'm crying. Silent and selfish, crying for myself and all the ways I'm inconvenienced by my burning wrong love for someone who doesn't, won't, can't love me back. Crying for me, thinking of me, the way I always do, even at Sasuke's brother's funeral, when the focus should be on them.

And poor Naruto, who thinks so highly of me that he interprets my self-pity for grief.

I don't have the heart to clue him in on what a selfish fucking asshole I am, so I wipe my tears away and nod and rip my gaze from Sasuke, because looking at him sometimes makes me wish I was six feet under. And that's no way to feel at a burial: jealous of the dearly departed.

* * *

Sasuke disappears after the funeral. So do Itachi's Akatsuki bandmates.

Part of me sees the writing on the wall, but you know me pretty well by now, don't you? And you know that I'm really good at tuning out the things I don't want to accept, focusing on other things.

My counselor would call it 'denial,' if I had one.

So I do what I always do when I'm stressed, or upset, or need to unwind, or need to forget. And because everyone's clamoring around the news about Itachi, Studio A is wide open.

As I stretch out against the barre, there's a tentative soreness, kind of new, concentrated mostly around my thighs and in my back. It's because of a new, clandestine, illicit workout I'm getting late, late at night, when Sasuke shows up drunk, or with red eyes, and always expectant. And I don't have the heart or the courage or the _ability_ to turn him away when he comes to me for help, because that's what it is. It's not that he's interested in me, or likes me, or loves me. It's that I can make him forget for a little while, I can give him something that he can't get from anybody else, and that at best, he finds me attractive enough to pound into the mattress until we're both so tired, we can't move.

That's not love, I tell myself, even though it's burning pretty strong on my end. That's _sick._ That's _demented._

But so am I. So are _we._ So when he knocks on my door – just two quick, successive, demanding raps – and I open it and he looks me right in my eyes, and he doesn't say a word, I let him inside my room and my heart and me.

So because sick, twisted, demented girls like me deserve this particular ache, I don't let it stop me as I back-bend, grab the arch of my foot and extend my leg high.

_Don't forget yourself, Sakura,_ I tell myself, all the good advice I'll ignore later when it counts. _Don't give him all this power. You're you and that's got to matter sometime. What you want and what you need and what makes you happy, all that has to matter sometime. Don't give him everything without taking anything back. Don't lose sight of your goals for the sake of some boy._

But he's _not_ 'some boy.' That's what makes him such an impossibility. I feel _so much_ for him, and that's not _fair,_ but he goes and writes his own rules. Fuck what I want. Fuck what I deserve. I'll take what he gives me, whatever miniscule, negligible, insulting fraction of himself he'll let me have in exchange for _everything._

Is this love? I wonder, halfway through a glissade and all the way gone. I've never been in love before so it's not like I know what to expect, but I'm pretty sure self-disgust isn't at the top of the list. Regret and guilt and doubt and confusion, that _can't_ be what they make all those nice romance movies about. Right? Am I _that_ naïve, _that_ insipid, _that_ blissfully unaware, to think that love is supposed to be more than what I'm feeling?

Is this just my much-needed wakeup call?

Because if this is love, I want no part of it.

Only problem is, it's not like I know how to fight my way back out of it. Considering, you know, I have no idea how I let myself fall in the first place.

I don't want this. I don't need this. I don't deserve this. This ill-timed mockery of a Disney romance, where Cinderella gives herself away and Prince Charming's too fucked up to care, where both of us are crashing and burning and willing, which makes it all worse. This isn't me. This isn't Sakura fucking Haruno.

Only it _is,_ and _that's_ why I feel myself moving without making any conscious effort. I look at the mirror midway through a series of pirouettes that would normally make me sick, but today, no sicker than I already make myself. And there she is again, that girl on fire, the one who took over me a few weeks ago, the one Tsunade was impressed by.

The one I never thought I could be again.

I watch that girl, the other me, the _better_ me, what few glimpses I can spare between spins and turns and bends and breaks. I watch her leap higher than I ever could, I watch her spin faster, I watch her nail the landing. She's gorgeous, that girl, sure of herself even if she's got no direction, because there's so much _beauty_ in just letting _go._

And maybe that's what Sasuke is, for me. Maybe that's what's so difficult to nail down about him.

Because shit if he doesn't feel like my brand new passion. Shit if he doesn't make me feel _alive._ Even if it's such a fucked up, screwed up, messed up shitty way of bringing someone to life, how can it be anything _but_ love when I feel _so much?_

The same way that dance makes me feel – immortal and powerless, beautiful and tragic, perfect and fucked up in half-equal, semi-fair measure – Sasuke makes me feel, with one look.

Sweat and tears fly and I scream with the _unfairness_ of it all. I scream and I keep moving and I dance, because that's what I do and who I am.

And I leave my fucking ballet flats in my locker.

* * *

I do something different that night. After I'm showered from my impromptu dance cyclone, there's some vestiges of the Other Me peeking through the typical neurotic Sakura exterior. You know, the Other Me who knows she wantsneedsdeserves better than what she's been getting from Sasuke, and she's not happy at all with our current arrangement. Sex under grief and no words.

I don't want the world from Sasuke, you know. I don't even need a relationship, for as much as it would kill me to rewrite his role in my life, and designate him to something less than what I really want. He's grieving. You see it in his posture, in those dead beautiful eyes, in the set of his jaw and the pallor of his skin, stark white under the streaking black tattoos.

In the fresh bleeding cuts on his fingers made from guitar frets.

I know it would be criminally insensitive to expect anything concrete from him right now, when he's so devastated. His first priority has to be dealing with his grief from Itachi's death, and I want to help him through it.

But not like _this._ Not to the point where he associates sex with me, with death and sadness. I want him to be happy again, but this isn't the right way.

So because I feel stronger after I let the Other Me come shining through, I don't greet Sasuke at the door when he knocks at precisely 11:36 PM. 24 minutes from midnight and a new year. I've made no plans. Maybe because I knew I'd already be occupied. But I don't open the door for him.

Instead, I call out softly, "Come in," and I don't move from my seat on the bed. Back against the wall, arms folded around my knees, it's not a sexually inviting position, and when Sasuke opens the door, I wonder if he's disappointed.

There will be words tonight. Because I deserve them, and so does he. And we're indelibly destructive people but people change, don't they? Sometimes?

He's gorgeous as ever, dead eyes and all, and he's dressed in a T-shirt and jeans even though it's freezing out and we don't live in the same building. I know if I touched him, his skin would be cold. His tattoos look fresh compared to his unusually pale skin, and he smells like cologne and liquor. Whiskey, usually. He tastes like whiskey when he kisses me, usually.

"Sit down," I tell him, and I smile. He's been drinking, but he isn't all the way drunk.

Sasuke eyes me warily, like I'm some kind of big game hunter waiting to set off a snare if he gets too close. I wonder what that must be like, to live like Sasuke does, where everything is an enemy and no one can be trusted. What a terribly lonely life that must be, and there's one way, at least, we can connect with each other that doesn't end with another gold condom wrapper in my trashcan.

He doesn't sit.

"How are you doing?" I ask him, ignoring that. My hands itch to finger-comb my damp hair the way I always do when I'm nervous, but I don't want to be nervous Sakura, I want to be strong. I keep them wrapped around my knees.

"Don't ask that," he tells me, his voice dark and forbidding. He's got his walls up tonight. He always does, until he tears them down long enough to fuck me, only to build them up before he leaves.

"It's what you're supposed to ask, Sasuke," I say gently, patting the space next to me. "I know it had to have been hard for you, today."

Sasuke just scoffs. I'm not getting anywhere.

"Look, I…"

"Just forget it, Sakura."

He turns back to the door. He's leaving.

And it isn't fair, to hold him to any kind of standard when he's such a mess, to have any expectation whatsoever. It's not fair to him. But I get _mad._

"So that really is the only reason you come here, huh."

Sasuke stops, and swivels back to face me, and there's that same fiery hatred in his eyes there was the day he lashed out at me at Ink and Iron. But that's fine, let him hate me, because I'm pretty sure I hate him right now, too.

"I know you're hurting and I'm trying everything I can to be there for you," I snap, and then I'm on my feet, too. Because the way I think and the way I feel, that has to matter at some point. And he's grieving and he's hurt and he's sad and he's wounded and he's mourning and he's lost his only family, but he's self-medicating with me and that's wrong. "But not like…not like _this,_ Sasuke."

"Didn't you offer this?" he sneers at me, full of contempt for who I am. "'I can make you forget, Sasuke,'" he mimics me, finger quotes and all.

I've never wanted to punch anyone harder than I want to punch him right now.

"Not anymore," I say hotly. "I thought…I thought maybe…"

"You thought maybe _what?_" he snaps, taking a few steps closer to me and there's all that rage there, boiling under the surface of his skin. I get the sense that most of it isn't even directed towards me, but who else has he got, to unleash on? "You thought maybe I was coming here because I _liked you?_ Because I wanted to _be with you?_ Because I…"

I don't slap him. I'm not a Disney princess, I don't have that kind of dramatic inclination.

I shove him. Hard. His chest. He stumbles back a bit before he rights himself again, eyes dark, teeth bared.

"_I had no expectations,_" I tell him harshly, brutally honest. It's sick and liberating to bare the truth. "I wanted to take your pain away for a little while and it's the only card I had to play. But I won't pretend to be okay with this arrangement anymore, I won't pretend to be okay waiting for you to fuck me without any feeling and keep riding this sick carousel. I want to _be there_ for you, Sasuke, and if it's just as your friend, then…"

"You've _never_ been just a friend to me," Sasuke growls, and I stop dead. Eyes wide. Heart racing.

No way.

No _way._

"I'm a _mess,_ Sakura, or haven't you noticed that? I know this is fucking wrong. I know it's fucked up to touch you the way I do. I know I don't deserve you. But you're…you're all I've got."

It's not a confession of undying love, hell, it's barely a confession at all. It's not Shakespeare. It's damn sure not Disney.

It's Sasuke. It's truth and bitterness and he's cynical and I'm naïve and neither one of us know what the hell we're doing, just that it's wrong and out of order. Just that we're not ready for it.

Just that we're doing it anyway.

"You're so important, Sasuke," I whisper, my anger leaving me as I take in his bitter expression, as I replay the revelation I know he wasn't ready to admit. "So, so important."

See it, Sasuke! See how much you are to me. See how you're my everything. See how you're bringing me to life little by little, see how I'm getting color back, see how…see how much you _are._ Just for being _you._

"It hurts to be with you," I tell him, tracing his jaw with my fingers. "It hurts me because you're hurting and I don't know how I can help you without ruining us. It's okay if you don't care about me that way, it's _okay._ Just let me know, Sasuke, let me know what I can do to take this hurt away. You matter, you're the most im…just…I don't know, just tell me what to do!"

How can I make him understand?

I kiss him quickly, just to let go of some of this boiling _whatever_ inside of me.

"Let me have you," he says, less of an order than a plea.

It's 12:00 midnight, on the dot, when he kisses me back, and it's slow. It's gorgeous. It's a Disney kiss from an action hero.

He's slow that night. It isn't a bruising, relentless tidal wave of reckless abandon, the way it usually is. Every move he makes is controlled, purposeful; like an apology. Like he's trying to rewrite our fucked history into something more…dignified.

It's so good and so beautiful and so much that I cry, and he just kisses my tears away and holds me like I matter.

I still don't know where I stand, where we are. But I know that Sasuke falls asleep that night with me, he doesn't retreat to his own room after we're finished. I know he keeps one hand fisted in my hair as we lay together, damp with sweat, my face pressed against his throat.

It's starting to feel like hope, you know. That maybe, once he gets better and feels better and moves on from this awful, awful thing, then we might have a chance, me and him. Maybe he already likes me (I think he might), and maybe it'll get stronger. Maybe I can make him happy. Maybe I can bring him to life the way he brought me.

Maybe we have a future.

* * *

I never meant to read the message.

I hear a vibration the next morning and I reach automatically for my phone on the end table by my bed. Sasuke doesn't move, his arm stays anchored around my waist and he keeps breathing slow. I figure it's Ino. Maybe Hinata.

It's not. It's from someone named Orochimaru. I've grabbed the wrong phone, but I've read the message before I realize my mistake.

_If you've given anymore thought to our offer,_ it says, the words inscribed into my brain in blue-and-green iPhone chat, _please let us know. Remember what Itachi would have wanted._

I blink, I frown, I wonder.

_Offer? What Itachi would have wanted?_

That writing on the wall I mentioned? Yeah, that's starting to look a lot more clear right now.

Because if I remember right, Orochimaru is the name of Akatsuki's band manager.

* * *

**note..** hey everybody! phillies have won five straight so i'm feeling like i want to spread some love, somehow.

so sakura's starting to figure shit out. i like to have parallels to the manga in my stories sometimes, and i always really liked in the manga how she knew before everybody else did what sasuke was thinking right before he left. i like sakura so much.

anyways, i hope you liked it and if you did, let me know! you guys are great :)

GO PHILS.

xoxo daisy jane :)


	16. Permanence

I write her name in Sharpie on my wrist.

It's an amateurish thing to do. Any snot-nosed kid who knows which hand to write with can draw a fucking picture on their skin. But the Sharpie is there and it's a way to see what a tattoo might look like on your skin before you actually draw it.

There's no art in it.

But there's no art in anything in my life right now.

It doesn't suit her at all, the simple font I use. Black bold strokes, since I only ever use black-and-grey tones and all she is to me is color brought to life. Color and music and art. She deserves more than a quick Sharpie job on the inside of my wrist on a snowy January Sunday.

Still, though, I see the parallelism. Black and bold and seemingly permanent, her name is on my skin, intimate and shocking in its clarity. But over time, and with enough scrubbing, it'll fade into nothingness. And maybe I'll be able to forget it was ever there in the first place.

* * *

It's weird.

Almost like the snow on the ground and in the trees and still coming down overhead is washing away the camouflage, it's getting harder and harder to ignore the vulgar ugliness of Konoha Performing Arts Academy.

I used to be apathetic about things here. Sort of resigned to them. Neither loved it nor hated it. There was a balance, a comfortable one, and I struck it and carved myself a niche that I was okay with being in. Not even enough passion to hate where I was.

Now, Itachi's dead. Now, I see this place for what it really is: a breeding ground for monsters. A place that takes the best and brightest and makes them shine, shine so bright they burn like dying stars. Like Itachi did. Itachi, who used to be a normal kid with a love for music.

Itachi, who gave up everything he had to pursue his dream, only to find it extinguished and covered in ash once he achieved it. Itachi, who turned his back on love and family and true friendship to chase fame and fortune.

Itachi, who died alone on Christmas morning in snow and solitude.

It's this place. This fucking campus with its sprawling yards and its flowers that bloom every spring in the same flowerbeds, the same donors who donate the same millions to keep up on the maintenance, the same teachers who teach the same shit to the same students, who grow up and die like Itachi did: alone, and with nothing.

I'm sickened by it.

My stomach hurts just on the walk to Kakashi's. I feel like I want to throw up just by _being_ here. I can't stand being in my room. I can't stand being on the grounds. The dining hall is hell. The studio is hell. I can't even look at my _friends,_ because they're so indoctrinated in this program that they don't even know they're all a part of this fucking machine. The one that killed my brother.

The only refuge I can really find is in the tattoo parlor. People leave me the fuck alone here except when I want them around, and lately, all I can seem to stomach is Sakura. She's got her own thing, too, so I can't expect her to be there every second. She's got dance. That's her.

But there's some kind of warped comfort in solitude. I can fuck around with my designs here, and it's quiet because Kakashi's given everyone the week off. Dead inside. It's just me on the red couch where Sakura took my breath away, and my sketchpad and my charcoal and…

"Hey," comes her breathy voice from behind me. Just hearing it makes me feel like coming in out of the rain. She's sullied with the reputation of KPAA same as everybody else, but my mind races to find ways to except her from the rule. An exception, always an exception.

"I knew you'd be here," she continues, and I don't turn away from my sketchpad, but I make sure the sleeve of my jacket covers the half-faded Sharpie smear on my wrist that might tip my hand. I hear her footsteps – light, dainty, always delicate – and then she sits next to me, uninvited but more welcome than I want her to be.

I want her to be nothing to me, but she's threatening to be everything.

"I brought food," she says with a smile that doesn't touch her eyes. I glance at the bag of Chinese takeout she's holding and accept it with a sigh. Like it's a burden to have someone here to take care of me, to worry about whether or not I eat something.

"Thought you had practice," I mumble, setting down my sketchpad and taking up a pair of chopsticks instead.

"Left early," she says carelessly, and I might be the only person in the universe who knows what a big deal that is for her. She's changing, I think, into something else, which might be why it's difficult to include her in my contempt for KPAA. Like she's pulling away on her own.

I watch as she flicks open the lid on a carton of rice with the tips of her chopsticks and she digs in. She's been eating lately. The color's high in her cheeks lately, like everything right down to her complexion is improving as she tugs away from the rigorous demands of dance. Everything about her begs me to reconsider, begs me to rethink, begs me to reevaluate.

She's changed. All isn't lost. There's hope and shit.

We eat in silence. The food tastes like ash in my mouth. Ashes everywhere. Burnt soil and nothing. I eat though because she's eating, too. Survivor's mentality.

Then she leans her head on my shoulder and sighs.

"What?" I ask dully. I can't inject any feeling into my voice if I tried. Since the funeral, I've felt unbelievably dead. Too numb to even feel conflicted.

"I've been thinking," she says wistfully.

An understatement. Sakura's a thinker. She's always thinking about something or other.

"Hn."

"I was wondering if maybe you'd…do something for me."

I raise an eyebrow and lean my head against hers. Her hair smells amazing. Like lilacs or some shit.

"You think I can do something for you." She must hear the skepticism in my voice, because she giggles a little, slides her fingers over my knee.

"Yeah. Something I…I mean, I don't know if you'd be willing to do it. It's kind of…it's fucking crazy, Sasuke. But I'm gonna do it with or without you, and I'd rather it be _you_ who does it."

No clue what she's talking about.

"Sakura. What do you want."

Then Sakura sits up and turns to me and there's something blazing in her eyes. Determination. Resolution. It's kind of refreshing to see someone look so alive, when I feel so dead inside. Almost like I can absorb her liveliness and wouldn't that just be fucking swell.

"I want a tattoo," she says breathlessly.

"You can't," I say automatically, even as this dead zone in my head starts to peel back, and I look at her pale, perfect skin, and old habits come rushing back. Habits where I paint her like a picture, where I mark that gorgeous skin with needles and ink. I see flowers on her legs and spirals on her arms, and something tribal on her lower back and a racy suggestion on her thigh and a portrait on her shoulderblade and…

"Why can't I?" she asks, a challenge.

"You're in dance. Your teacher would kill you."

"Let me worry about that. I want this, Sasuke. I want something specific and if you don't do it, I'll find someone else to do it. But I want it to be you."

I frown. This isn't like her. Dancers can't be marking up their body with the kind of thing that I do. Dancers need to be blank canvases; it's what makes them so beautiful.

"What do you want?" I demand, wondering what could be so meaningful to her, so important, that she'd give her profession and education a middle finger this way. People get tattoos for tons of reasons, but Sakura isn't the kind of person to want something permanent on her skin without it meaning something serious. I wonder what she'd want from me. I wonder what she…

Then she lifts my hand and holds it to her chest, over her racing heart. With bright, beautiful eyes as dazzling as starlight and an inner rage, an inner strength no one can even begin to comprehend, she holds my hand in place and says, "I want you, Sasuke. I want your name. Right here. Right over my heart."

The apathy's shredded. With a crazy request, with a handful of words, with the single stupidest thing I've ever heard a human being say, she's ripped right through my practiced scorn. I'm alive then. I'm rejuvenated.

I don't make one fucking protest.

Instead I watch as the sleeve of my jacket slides back a bit and exposes my wrist. My eyes travel from my hand, pinned over Sakura's heart, to the pale skin on my wrist that reveals the half-faded ghost of her name in Sharpie. And I'm not alone in this, in wanting a physical, permanent reminder of the way she makes me feel.

I've never fucking loved anything more.

* * *

It's impossibly, mind-blowingly, earth-shatteringly erotic. I've slept with her before. I've fucked her. I've made her moan, made her scream, made her cry until all she thought, saw, and breathed was me. I've made love with her, kissed her shoulder and her forehead and each silvery tear from her glittering eyes like she was a princess. I've seen every inch of her perfect skin.

So this shouldn't be as powerful as it is for me, but shit. I sit in my chair and she's lounging back in the client's seat; she's removed her shirt, she's only wearing jeans and boots and a strapless bra so I have enough canvas to work with, and her long hair's fanned out behind her and her eyes are on me, hard and ready.

It's almost enough to make me lose it right there. This fucking mess of a girl is letting me – demanding that I mark her up with my name. That I write myself over her heart. I have to focus. I have to concentrate. This is my signature. This is gonna be my _masterpiece._ Six letters and she's gonna be mine forever.

"It'll hurt," I promise quietly, as I get my needles ready. I'm not gonna use color. I'm gonna use black. Black so she can't cover it up, black so it's there forever.

"That's okay," she replies back, her voice soft, like she's worried if she speaks too loud, this cosmic moment between us will break.

It's deadly quiet in my tattoo room, when I turn on the gun.

I watch as her ab muscles flex and tighten in anticipation. She's nervous, I can tell, the way a typical person is before their first tattoo. She doesn't know what to expect, just that it's gonna hurt.

The good thing is Sakura's got a decent-sized rack. More flesh to absorb the impact. The worst tattoos are along muscle and bone. Longer healing time, too. But something small, in an area as plush as just above her breasts, isn't gonna hurt as badly.

I consider telling her – murmuring something suggestive and filthy just to watch her open eyes darken – but that would spoil this moment between us. This crazy, psychotic moment where I'm leaning over her, a tattoo gun in my hand and her demand hovering in the air between us.

"Make it beautiful, Sasuke," she tells me with a sweet, trusting smile.

As if I could. As if tarnishing her gorgeous skin with something like my fucking name could ever be beautiful. But I do it because I want my name on her heart as much as she wants it there. I want her to have something of me to hold onto.

…and if I choose to leave – it's looking likelier every minute – something to remember me by.

I'm that selfish. I'm that self-absorbed. To demand a lifelong preoccupation from Sakura without so much as a whisper of reciprocation. I love her in silence and that's fucked up enough. She doesn't need to know it.

But I'll take this from her. I'll fulfill her insane request. Because this is the best high in the world, the moment I press the needle to her skin.

"Hold still," I breathe.

She's a good client. She doesn't fidget, doesn't move. A slight wince as she adjusts to the new sensation but nothing more than that. I feel her eyes boring into me as I work, and knowing that she's watching me work on her in this vulnerable position is the most arousing thing I've ever experienced. Like those rare moments when we're fucking and our eyes meet. Like voyeurism, almost, watching her as I'm getting her off. Illicit.

My free hand, splayed over the fine contours of her exposed stomach, tightens into a fist. I'm aware that she subtly squeezes her thighs together – a sure sign she's turned on, and trying to hide it.

It's unbelievably, insanely, stupidly powerful, this connection right now. Not even when I was buried deep inside her did I feel as close to her as I do now.

I don't use a stencil this time. Just a simple freehand font. The same name I've been writing on test papers and homework assignments and job applications and napkin corners since I could pick up a pen, on this impossibly significant place on this impossibly significant girl.

When I'm done – it doesn't take long, nowhere near as long as I wish it would – I set the gun down and swipe the skin with a paper towel to wipe away any excess ink. There's no blood. Like I always suspected, her skin takes to the ink beautifully.

"There's aftercare," I tell her quietly, massaging a moisturizer over the skin. "You'll want to…"

"I want to see it," she cuts me off, sitting up and subsequently pressing herself harder into my hand.

I nod stiffly, unable to suppress my desire for her for much longer, and stand up, helping her up as well. I lead her to the floor-length mirror behind the supply cabinet, and hearing her gasp of delight overshadows all the bullshit that's been happening this week.

"Sasuke," she breathes, eyes wide and adoring on the black signature I've inscribed into her skin. "It's…it's _perfect._"

The easiest tattoo in the world, one's own name. A simple, almost lazy font. Six letters that mark her heart as mine and use her body as the deed.

I stare at our reflections in the mirror, two beautiful people with unbelievable baggage, with secrets between them piling like mountain. A broke, anxious, anorexic ballerina and an angry, directionless guitarist who'd rather work a tattoo gun. Familyless and with better friends than we deserve. And she stands there next to me like she was made to be there, with no shirt and my name on her chest.

_I could stay,_ I tell myself, terrified by the notion that this imperfect perfectionist might be enough. _I don't have to leave. She could…she could be enough for me. She could be enough to outweigh all this SHIT._

"Oh my God, Sasuke."

I look down and see that she turns to face me, her hands on my shoulders, smiling. _Smiling._

"_Thank you,_" she tells me softly.

The arousal that had built between us throughout the tattoo process comes to a head. Mindful of the stinging pain that's got to be coursing over her heart, I kiss her. I lay back on the seat she was sprawled out in and bring her on top of me to avoid aggravating her sensitive skin. And I take her slow and drag it out for her, groan at every breathy little scream she releases, commit every moment of this to memory.

This perfect night with an imperfect person, who weakens my resolve to leave. I forget about Akatsuki. I forget about Orochimaru and his ridiculous offer. I even forget Itachi's will, dictating that I take his place in his band. I forget everything except Sakura for the hundredth time, and when it's over, right before she slides back into her shirt, I take a look at the hard black letters spelling my name over her heart, and know she'll have no choice but to remember me, too.

* * *

"Use the lotion I gave you," I tell her, referring to the Aquaphor. "Don't pick it when it scabs."

We're outside her dorm. I've fucked her properly in my tattoo room, the place I feel most at home at and the girl who means more than any of it, and like a fucking gentleman, I've walked her home.

"Okay," she says with a trusting smile, about to head up the stairs. "You coming up tonight?"

"Later," I say easily, even though it's already late. I have a meeting to make. An offer to decline. "Go relax."

She nods. Smiles again, and kisses me goodbye. Dances on up to her dorm room while I watch to make sure she gets in safe.

"She's very beautiful, Sasuke."

The oily voice behind me makes me stiffen on the sidewalk. I'm due to meet with him at the bar, so I don't know why he's here.

"What're you doing here?" I demand, turning to face him with narrowed eyes. I don't like that he's here. I know next to nothing about him besides his notorious management style, but something about him makes me uneasy about his being here, on campus. So close to Sakura.

"I wanted to see you one on one," replies Orochimaru smoothly, a pleasant grin on his face. "I suspected you might be more accepting of reason, if you were to hear from me alone, without Deidara and Kisame and the rest."

"Don't waste your breath," I tell him harshly. "I'm not joining."

"Hmm. And I suspect _she_ might something to do with that decision?"

Amber eyes flicker to the building Sakura just disappeared into, and I'm infuriated for some reason.

"It was Itachi's will, you know. That you take his place in Akatsuki. I've never met a boy so averse to fame and fortune."

"I don't need that shit," I snarl. "Look where it got Itachi."

Orochimaru nods, taking it in stride. "More importantly, look where it's left you. Alone. Grieving. A poor boy with no family left to speak of."

"You bastard, you-"

"Ah, ah, ah, Sasuke. Just do me the honor of hearing me out, before you cast aspersions on my character. You are trying to hide it – attempting to move on from it – but you are suffering. Anyone with eyes can see that. You loved your brother as he loved you, and now he is gone. You suffer from the severance of the bond you two shared."

There's snow falling around us and I want him to choke on it. Choke on it and get out of here, leave me alone and get away from Sakura and Naruto and take his shitshow band on the road with a new guitarist.

"But replacing your love for Itachi with your love for this lovely young lady will not take away your pain, Sasuke. It will only open you up to the possibility of an all-new ache."

"What the hell are you talking about?" I demand angrily, fists clenched tight.

"It is because of loving bonds that we suffer," he tells me, about as approachable-looking as a crime boss in the expensive suit and the painted fingernails. "Lovely, distracting bonds," and I _know_ he means Sakura, "either fade away over time," and I think of her name in Sharpie on my wrist, almost all the way gone now, "or go up in flames," and I think of Itachi, dead in a ditch on Christmas morning.

Orochimaru's getting to me.

"Itachi's love for you was prevalent in everything he did," he goes on, now that he knows he's got my attention. "He worked hard to ensure that you would be taken care of, in the event that something would happen to him that would prevent him from keeping his eye on you. Knowing his career was coming to a close – whether by a surprising retirement, or an unsurprising death – he wanted to ensure that you would be able to pursue your dreams. Eclipse them, even. And Sasuke, with Akatsuki, you can do _everything._"

I can. I can, with Akatsuki. I can get the hell out of KPAA, out of this shit that created Itachi and helped him cultivate the demons that later killed him. I can leave Naruto and the guys, because Orochimaru is right, and all bonds are, are weaknesses. I can leave _Sakura,_ and forget the way she's inscribed her name on my heart like she demanded I do to her. I can honor Itachi's last wishes. I can have the life I wanted growing up. I can…

I couldn't have her, then.

"Come with me, Sasuke," Orochimaru whispers, his voice like silk. "We leave tomorrow evening. The tour bus will be waiting for you at 6:00 downtown. Think of all you can have…think of what Itachi wanted for you. Honor your brother, Sasuke. Honor his love for you."

* * *

I don't let Sakura sleep that night, not now that we're running on borrowed time.

I take the time to commit her to memory. I take her everywhere she'll let me, on her bed, on her floor, in her shower. There are tears in my eyes and I hide them in her hair, and when it's time for me to leave in the morning, I kiss her slow. I try and confess the way I feel in that kiss, and part of me hopes she won't get it. Because I love Sakura, and I can tell, I know, that she loves me.

But it's not enough.

Better she hates me tonight, when I leave in silence, without a goodbye. Better she hates me than knows how I really feel about her.

"See you later, Sasuke," she says happily, unaware that I'm already halfway gone.

On the walk back to my dorm, to pack my things, I look at my wrist on a whim. Her name's faded completely.

It's like she was never there.

I can only hope life imitates art this time around.

* * *

**note..** yup, sasuke's leaving :(

phillies keep losing so why should anything good happen to anyone ever.

lololol love you guys :)

xoxo daisy :)


	17. Soutenu en Tournant

Miss Suzume hasn't seen my tattoo yet.

At practice the next day, I make sure it's covered up. It itches like crazy and it's sore in some places and it's aggravated by my tight practice clothes and I love every fucking letter.

I don't know why I did it. I don't know what I was thinking, and I sure as hell don't know why Sasuke agreed to do it. How crazy was it of me? To go to the boy whose name I felt like I needed on my body, and ask him to write it?

But he'd done it. He'd protested that I wanted a tattoo in the first place, but showed absolutely no reservations once I told him what I wanted the tattoo to be.

I dance well enough that neither Miss Suzume nor the other girls notice the tenderness on my chest, and after enduring an expected reaming from my bitch instructor for chintzing on my rehearsals lately, I make my way to the dining hall for lunch with everybody.

It's when I sit down between Naruto and Ino that I realize something isn't quite right.

I can't really put my finger on it. Everything's normal. I greet everybody at the table and we all negotiate our food trays so they fit comfortably, and I decorate my salad with a light but satisfying amount of balsamic vinaigrette, and Sai's working on some sketch for his Drawing class and Hinata's got her headphones in on Naruto's other side listening to the fourth movement of our newest routine and Ino's giggling about something or other.

Maybe it's the empty seat that draws my attention.

"Where's Sasuke?" I ask, my voice sounding remote when my heart, directly underneath a blunt black scrawling of his name, begins to race.

"Dunno," says Naruto, with a frown, like he's been wondering, too. "I stopped by his room to see if he wanted to come to lunch but he wasn't there."

"Kiba says he saw him leaving Ink and Iron earlier," Ino reports. "But he looked like he was in a hurry."

_Oh, no. Oh no oh no oh no._

It feels like I'm going to be sick. That kind of…_dread,_ I guess you'd call it, that makes your stomach turn. I shove my salad away almost violently and I'm on my feet in the next instant, my chair scraping loudly on the linoleum floor.

Everyone jerks and looks up, confused at my reaction, and I know I've got to look like a psychopath with my eyes wide and my heavy breathing and my hands in my hair. They don't understand. They don't know what Sasuke's going to do.

"I…I'll be back," I manage, and then I run.

* * *

Everything's cliché when it starts to rain.

There's a bus, and a bus stop, and a thousand people, but all I can hear is my own racing heart and my own heaving breaths. I ignore the crowd and I ignore the cliché, because all that matters to me in this second is getting to Sasuke. Stopping him, before he makes a mistake.

I look around, panicking, dramatically underdressed for the freezing rainy day in my dance clothes, hair a wild mess whipping back and forth, bound to attract a ton of attention. (It's a mark of how serious the situation is, that I couldn't give a shit what anyone thinks about me.)

I don't even know if I'm in the right place. I mean it's not like tour buses need to use the bus station like normal buses, but where else can I go? I don't know what I'm doing, I just hope this is where I need to be. It feels like it is, but when I look around, trying to see through the rain, I can't find it. I can't find him.

For one mind-numbing moment, I think that maybe, _maybe_ I'm too late. Maybe he left, and I couldn't stop him. I wasn't there in time to stop him. The thought's too nauseating to even contemplate, though, so I shove it back down and push my way through a throng of people gathered at Gate 2. I still have time, I tell myself. I still have time because my heart's still beating. Beating the way it wouldn't if Sasuke had already left.

In sheer desperation, I shout out his name. My voice sounds brittle and feminine and _weak,_ and I _hate_ that I sound like this, but it does the trick. Because no sooner do I scream out, "Sasuke!" than I hear his deep voice from behind me, in the shadows underneath the departures sign.

"Sakura."

I'm so relieved I almost cry, and I whirl around to face him, and there he is. I'm not too late. He's here, with his guitar on his back and a bag on his shoulder and his hands in his pockets, looking at me stoically from underneath his messy black bangs.

"Sasuke you didn't leave yet," I say weakly, ducking around a crowd of people to reach him.

"You shouldn't be here," he tells me, and he sounds empty. Dead. His eyes are, too.

"Neither should _you,_" I rebuke. Fiercer this time, because I may not know much about Sasuke, but I know that he _can't_ leave. It would be something catastrophic, some massive _calamity_ that he'd regret forever. I know that, with every fiber of my being. I know he has to stay.

"You won't change my mind this time, Sakura. Go home."

"What are you talking about? Sasuke…Sasuke where are you going?" Even though I already know. I want to touch him, but he looks so cold and forbidding that I can't bring myself to. Which is ironic, and _painful,_ considering what happened just twenty four hours ago.

He looks away from me, at the platform where everyone's waiting for a bus. Like I'm not worth his time or attention. It feels like getting hit with an icy sledgehammer, but I tamp down my pain and focus on his. He must really be suffering, if he thinks there's no way he can stay here in Konoha. He must really be hurting in a way that doesn't show in his death eyes, to think this is his only choice.

How can I take it away, Sasuke? How can I chase your pain and restore your sun?

"I won't stay there," he murmurs, his voice soft but tinged with ice. Ice he's never turned against me, but now it feels like a knife at my throat. Like if I move wrong or breathe, he'll slash. "Itachi's dead. There's nothing left for me anymore."

_There's me!_ I want to tell him, the words choking me. _There's me for you, Sasuke! Me and the others, all your friends, Kakashi and the shop, NARUTO! There's EVERYTHING for you, don't walk away!_

"Please…please don't do this." I'm reduced to begging, but I don't care. I'd get on my knees if I thought it would change his mind. In a fit of insanity, I grab the collar of his jacket with both hands and I _hate_ that they're trembling, because I'm trying for strength of conviction but coming up short. Like always. Not strong enough. Never good enough.

I'm gonna lose him.

"I can't replace your brother," I whisper, and I watch as his defenses tremor for a moment, watch as the guard lowers from his eyes, watch as some of that warmth I've come to expect from Sasuke bleeds through his icy exterior, only to be chased away by glaciers again. "I know that, I can't…I can't take his place, nobody can. And if I could take this away, the way you're hurting, I _would,_ Sasuke, I swear it…I'd swallow it myself so you wouldn't have to feel this. But you can't leave us, you just _can't._ We need you."

"Sakura…"

"_I _need you!" I finally erupt, shaking him slightly. He doesn't move, just watches me. Impassive. The momentary breach of his defenses has passed, and he's a fortress again. All resolution and steel.

Then he speaks, and his voice is so fucking cold I want to cry, so I do.

"This place _created_ Itachi," he hisses, his eyes smoldering with hate. "It created him and then it destroyed him. I've got _nothing_ here but _hate_ for what they did to my brother, and to stay here another _minute_ makes me _sick._"

Another bus pulls up to the stop, but Sasuke just watches it pass; must not be the one he's looking for. I still have time, I tell myself wildly. I still have time because he's here and my heart's still beating.

"Then…then take me with you!" I beg. The physical repercussions of this aren't a thought in the world to me. Where he's going, for example. It could be anywhere. What he'll do when he gets there. I don't know. I'm a student in an elite ballet program, it's almost graduation and I need to be focused on making it big on my own; to throw it all away, to run off with a broken boy in the middle of the night, it's unfathomable, it's unthinkable, it's _never_ been done before.

But for Sasuke, for Sasuke I would do it. For Sasuke, I'd throw away the earth, moon, and sun if it meant he'd smile with his eyes.

He says nothing to my request, so I keep going. I have to, while I have his attention. I have to say the right thing. I have to say what he needs to hear so he won't leave me.

"I'll go anywhere," I whisper, almost frightened by how strongly I mean that. "Wherever you want to go, I'll go with you. I've got nothing tying me here but ambition. If you really can't stay here, if you can't get past what happened with Itachi, then take me with you."

"Why?" he finally demands, eyes narrowed; he still hasn't moved, even while I'm hanging onto his jacket like he'll fall off the earth if I let go.

I could tell him it' s because we're friends. I could tell him it's because it would kill Naruto, devastate all our friends. I could tell him it's because he's so close to graduating and wouldn't Itachi be proud if he graduated and…

Instead, I settle for the truth.

"Because I love you," I whisper back, and I can't see him through my tears. It's cathartic and sickening all at once, the way adrenaline fills me and leaves me intermittently, the way my bones have liquified and it's less me keeping Sasuke in place than Sasuke keeping me from falling off the edge of the world. I can't tell if I'm relieved to have finally said it, or horrified by it.

But there it is. Naked and full of all the honesty I could ever inject into anything. Action and emotion in equal measure, wild, reckless abandon. Passion the way I've never felt before, and even as I feel it all at once washing over me like the rain on the roof, my heart's breaking. It's shattering, even, and I don't care; I'd live with this, with this agony if it meant he'd _stay._ Because here, he's safe. Here, he's loved.

He can't go. If not for me, then for himself.

"I love you so much it hurts," I tell him. "So much, it feels like there isn't room in my heart for anything else. And I don't know if you feel that way about me and honestly I don't care. I just…I can't be without you. And if you can't stay here, then take me with you. And it can…it can be just the two of us. And we can leave all this behind, if that's what you want. But _please,_ Sasuke."

My hands slide from his jacket to the sides of his face, fingers dipping in his hair, trailing over his sculpted jaw. _Memorize him,_ I think, fiercely. _Because you might lose him._

"Please don't leave me," I whisper.

There's a moment, then, when I think he might agree.

There's a moment, then, when I think he might smile-smirk with one corner of his mouth higher than the other, a glint of perfect white teeth underneath, and he'll call me something derogatory and he'll kiss me and say, "Then let's go."

There's a moment, then, when I think about stepping onto a bus headed to nowhere with a boy headed for trouble with nothing but the soaking wet clothes on my back.

A moment when I think he'll let me.

Just a moment, that's my parting gift. That's all he'll give me before he kisses me, and in that kiss, I know it's over. Me. Him. Us. It's _over._ Because I know that goodbyes taste sweetest and I'm choking on fear and regret. I'm not enough. I'm _still_ not enough, because he's leaving and he won't take me with him.

"I'd thank you if I thought it was enough," Sasuke tells me, breathes the words against my lips and gets me high. "I'd apologize if I thought it'd make a difference." He kisses my forehead and has the decency to look regretful, even if _I'm_ the one with a chasm in my heart. "I'd stay if things were fair." He leans his forehead against mine, and it's all I can do not to just _collapse._

"It doesn't have to be this way," I tell him, desperately, but I know a lost cause when I see one. I know what a rejection is. I know what a slammed door looks like, and my window of opportunity's just been broken right in front of me. Now it's all I can do not to cut myself on the glass.

But Sasuke restores his shields. Sasuke pulls back away from me and my hands drop, useless, to my sides, all grace and poise fucking _vanished_, my body betraying me, along with Sasuke himself. And Sasuke shoulders his bag more securely as a bus painted in black with red clouds on the sides pulls up to the stop, his eyes faraway. I know he's already gone. I know I've already lost him.

I probably lost him weeks ago, only now he's helping me realize it.

"Take care, Sakura," he tells me, voice as aloof as ever but timbered with something else, something harder to nail down. My arms, shaking, trembling, slide around my waist and I bow my head, because I can't watch him walk away. I can't watch his broad shoulders, shoulders I clawed last night with frantic fingernails till they were red and sore, move away from me, can't watch it, won't do it. Sobs wrack my body and I do not fucking _care_ that everyone in the bus stop is watching me break down.

All I care about is that Sasuke's said his piece and now he's leaving. I hear his footsteps moving farther and farther away, and he's got my heart with him, too, he's taking it away from me and I don't know how to live, how to _function_ without it, but he doesn't care about that.

He doesn't care that I love him more than I love anything. More than I love life and dance and everyone else. He doesn't care that I'd throw _everything away_ to make him stay, to keep him, to leave with him. He doesn't care that he's everything to me.

It's only after the bus has left the station that I force some fucking feeling back into my legs.

But I don't go back to KPAA, not right away. And I don't follow him, either, because if he wanted me to, he would have told me.

He's made his choices, and now I've got to make mine.

If I had a heart, it would be iced over by now, but he's taken it with him, so all I've got left is my dignity, and even that's in tatters. But it won't be forever. I need to move on. I need to keep going. Not enough for Sasuke. Not enough to keep him. But I'm still here, I'm still _me._

Through the rain and the ice and the numbness that teases like dandelion fluff on the periphery of all this _suffering_, I make my way to KCA's campus right in the heart of the city. It's a long walk, it's freezing cold and people drive past me in their cars wondering, surely, what the hell I'm doing in this wintry storm dressed like I am, soaked right through my clothes. I don't care. I don't care about what _anybody_ thinks of me, and today is really, truly the first time in a long time where I can say that and not be called a liar.

I ignore the receptionist who asks me who I am and what do I need. I sidestep her without a thought and open the big oak double doors with the last of my strength.

Tsunade, sitting in her plush armchair with a sprawling amount of paperwork strewn across a fine cedar desk, doesn't look surprised to see me in her office, dripping wet, freezing cold, dead eyes and desperate.

Instead she smiles like she knew all along something I'm just beginning to barely understand.

Ballet. Sasuke. Ballet and Sasuke and _that's over now._ All that's left is me, and I will not put my future on hold one more _second._

"I want to be your student," I tell her.

And just like that, everything has changed.

* * *

**note..** yup sasuke left.

xoxo daisy :)


	18. Black and Gray

This new life here.

It isn't what I expected it would be.

(Nothing ever is.)

* * *

"Your linework's clean, dude," Deidara says, and he sounds impressed, and even if I'm past the point of caring about pretty much _anything_, any praise from Deidara is high praise. He's all art and very little thought. He admires the calf tattoo I've given him and I admire it, too. "Seriously, un. Good shit."

I rip off my latex gloves and toss them in the trashcan sitting beside me. The lighting's pretty decent in the tour bus; that's why whenever I work on my bandmates, we do it in here, wherever we happen to be parked.

See I thought once I got on the road, signed the papers with Akatsuki and left Konoha for good, I figured tattooing was behind me.

I'm a good brother now that my brother's dead and there's no one to grade me on it anymore. And Itachi told the band manager that I'm supposed to join Akatsuki as a guitarist – not as a tattoo artist. Nowhere in his secret plans for me did it say I was supposed to bring my needles and my gun, so I left all that shit behind. And I took Itachi's guitar and was prepared to close the book on that whole chapter.

Never occurred to me that my new bandmates would be more interested in my art than in my music.

It's not necessarily an unpleasant surprise or anything. It's not even a surprise, because to be surprised by something, you have to give a shit. And I don't fucking care anymore.

It's just unexpected.

Still, I go along with it. There's a lot of work to be done yet before I'm ready to debut with Akatsuki in a public venue; Orochimaru's been dragging us to press junkets and radio shows for stupid interviews, scheduling all kinds of dumbass meet-and-greets to get my name out there. Just doing manager shit. Generating public interest.

So this thing I do – this tattooing – it helps pass the time in between interviews.

"Linework's solid," Sasori commends, eyeing Deidara's tattooed serpent more maturely from his seat next to me. "Why black and gray, though, Sasuke? Some color would have really brought this to life."

Everyone's a critic.

"It's strong regardless," I say. It's a deflection.

I've never been good at color. I've never been _interested_ in color. Color's brought me nothing. Color's got me nowhere. Color is green-and-gold eyes shiny with silver tears, and flower pink silk on navy blue bedsheets and a ruby red flush and…

And shit I just can't have time for anymore.

"It doesn't need color," I add, leaning back in my chair. A three-hour session is no joke on your back, even if you're 17 and fit like I am.

"It's fine without it."

Sasori raises an eyebrow like he understands we're not _really_ talking about color anymore. Then he smirks and shakes his head and shows me some sketches he's been working on.

* * *

It's been four weeks since I joined up with Akatsuki and tonight we're playing our first gig.

I'd be nervous if I gave a shit but I don't. They don't pay me to think. They don't pay me to feel. They're not interested in my opinions.

Itachi wanted this for me. I didn't want it for myself. But this is the hand I've been dealt and it's all I can do to pay back my brother for everything he's done. Everything I never got the chance to thank him for.

Maybe he's onto something here. Maybe he knows what'll fix me. What'll make this emptiness inside me go away, since apparently I tried to fill it with ink and friends and an anorexic headcase and that got me fucking nowhere. Maybe he knows better than I do what's best for me.

I trust that.

Still, though. Four weeks of practicing with my bandmates – with Kisame, Itachi's best friend, and Deidara and Sasori who know more about art than most of the art students I know, and Konan the lead singer who watches me like she understands me – and it's only now we're playing in public. A big crowded venue, too. Ame, I think, judging by the rain.

I'm not nervous. Hell I'm not even _excited._ And this is something, really it is, something that should _be_ exciting. To any 17-year-old kid out there who ever picked up a guitar, I'm livin' the fuckin' dream. I am. I know it. There are a billion people out there who'd _kill_ to be in my shoes.

Backstage at The Bucket, Ame's largest, most famous stadium. A crowd of thousands gathered to see what Akatsuki's gonna be like without its star guitarist, dying to get a glimpse of the younger, less-talented, less-inspired, less everything brother of Itachi.

"SASUKE! SASUKE!" scream the crowd, with lights flashing and cameras flashing and this is what it means to be a rock star. "SASUKE! SASUKE! SASUKE!"

I know their songs. It didn't take me long to learn them on Itachi's old guitar because regardless of whether or not I'm _interested_ in guitar, I'm still good at it. I know I am. Maybe not like Itachi was, but I can shred and that's just a fact. As uninteresting a fact to me as, like, Ame's got a rainy climate and carrots are good for eyesight. Just something that happens and exists.

"SASUKE! SASUKE! SASUKE!"

So I'm ready. And I should be nervous and I should be happy. And when I play the opening riffs to Akatsuki's most famous song and the crowd goes fucking _nuts,_ I should feel like I'm doing the right thing. Honoring my brother and living my dream in one fell swoop.

Rock star. All they ever wanted me to be, and I'm doing it.

The sold out show streams live all over the world. Overnight I'm going from untested little brother to global superstar. I can already see where this is gonna take me, with every chord my fingers form on Itachi's frets, with every brooding glare I throw to the sold out crowd. To the stars and beyond. I made it. I'm here.

I fit in. It fits. It works. Orochimaru smirks from backstage and Itachi was right, this is where I should be. Far away from Konoha. Far away from them.

It's working. I did it.

…and yeah. I still don't fucking care.

* * *

Everyone's partying that night. To celebrate Akatsuki, and me, and the marriage of a megaband missing its lead guitarist and an aimless, angry kid running from the things that make him whole. Because that's cause for celebration, you know. I guess. Whatever.

I don't party with them, obviously. Because I've got nothing to celebrate.

Jesus, even listening to myself, I'm bored.

After the gig, I don't head back to the hotel where everyone's staying for the night. Instead I go right for the tour bus, trying to ignore the presence of the bodyguards Orochimaru's hired for all of us. The big guy – I think his name is Hidan, or whatever – follows me in case any fans get too crazy. As if I can't take care of myself.

Like I thought it would be, it's deserted. And it's the first time I've been _alone_, really just alone, in the last month since I've left Konoha.

The bus is a real piece of shit, seriously. There are too many people and not enough space. I've been sleeping in the world's smallest fucking bunk underneath Kisame who snores like it's his fucking job; I guess I always thought rock stars had better accommodations. Just, you know. Another one of those things that hasn't panned out the way I thought it would.

Still though it's not so bad, if it's just me. It's dark and quiet and secluded, and if I forget about Hidan's obnoxious presence just outside the door, gun ready to take down any screaming fans or assholes jonesing for a fight with a celebrity, then it's not terrible.

I rest my guitar on the tiny-ass table we're expected to eat off of and head to the back of the bus, where I've got my makeshift tattoo station set up. In reality, it's nothing more than one of the futons tugged out from the wall and a chair turned backwards for me to sit on while I work. But like I said, real good lighting. And I gave Deidara a tattoo today good enough to where he complimented it so as far as I'm concerned, this day is as good as it's gonna get.

Weird, how I get more satisfaction from a three-hour snake than I do from 50,000 people screaming my name.

I think about my next tattoo. Konan wants a rose on her back. No sweat, only she wants it in color.

…okay, fine.

I know what the hot button question is. I know what everyone's dying to ask.

I'm not an idiot. I didn't get this far being an idiot. Just a hopeless, dickless sad sack, but not an idiot.

Sakura.

Does it hurt to think her name? No, not anymore. It's been a month since I let that _cyclone_ of color tear me down with fiery eyes and pouty lips; the further I am from her, the better. She's radioactive like that. The more prolonged the exposure, the more dangerous.

I haven't heard from her. Not that I expected to. She begged me to stay once, at the bus stop last month, with the freezing rain all around her and all the color in the world in her eyes; but she won't do it again. Once is enough, to lay your pride and your dignity and your self-respect on the line for some asshole who won't accept it.

I know what everyone's thinking. That I'm an asshole and I should have stayed. That I should have put aside my _contempt_ for the place that _made Itachi_ what he fucking _died_ as.

Well fuck off. I didn't stay, and I sure as shit won't go back. Not even for her. Not even for what she brought into my life – fucking chaos. Chaos and disorder and disarray. Flooding this black-and-gray field of mine with a palette no artist ever saw before in the history of the world, like she had any right in the fucking universe.

Dragging me to dizzying highs with the scrape of her fingernails over my ribs, ripping the breath out of my throat with one strangled moan of my name…tearing me back down to earth and a few thousand feet beneath it with one pout of her lips. Chaos. Madness. Uncertainty and discord and I didn't fucking ask for that, the getting drunk off of her. The way each time she smiled at something I said, I felt like coming apart. I don't need it. I don't want it.

In this world of mine, in this black and gray world of mine, she's got no place. She can't fit.

And it doesn't fucking _matter_ that I maybe fucking love her.

It doesn't matter that I'm making the same mistakes Itachi did, with Hana, all over again. It's history repeating itself – the same sordid, disgusting tragedy of the Uchiha brothers, who found the things that made them whole and not only just let them _go,_ shoved them _away._

I didn't just break Sakura's heart that day in the rain, I demolished it. I let her tell me she loved me. I let her sob and scream and whisper and beg. I let her say the things I should have said to her with silence and stone laid around my heart like a barricade, and then I stole one more kiss I didn't deserve and left her there alone and scared and _sad._

And I knew it would come to that. It wasn't something out of the blue. It's one of the few things I was able to predict, that _miserable_ breaking of…of whatever we were. The writing was on the wall and I think she knew it.

I think that's why she asked me for that tattoo, right before I left.

There's a part of me that's arrogant enough to know how important I was to her. If any other girl in the world came to me, asking me what she asked me for, I would've filed a restraining order. Called them crazy.

But when Sakura told me she wanted me to write my name over her heart, _hours_ before I _knew_ I'd break it, I didn't hesitate.

Because I fucking wanted it there. My name in black over the apricot skin that picked up the ink so _well._ I wanted it there forever, a permanent reminder of the way I made her feel. Evidence that what happened between us really did happen; that she loved me enough to want to remember it forever, way after I was gone.

Leaning back on this makeshift tattoo bed, eyes closed as I remember the way it felt, driving that needle into her skin with her eyes on me, I could just throw up thinking on what I did to her.

…but I'm also fucking glad. She can't run from that harsh black lettering. It's there forever on her pretty ballerina skin as a testament to her love for me, and I sleep like a baby at night knowing it's there.

And you want to know why?

Because I'm _just like Itachi._ I'm devoted enough to blind ambition that I'd let go of the girl I loved…

But selfish enough to make sure she couldn't let go of me, too.

* * *

So yeah. There's your answer. There's your great big fucking answer about Sakura. I didn't choose her. I chose Itachi and the path he picked out for me in secret. I didn't choose her, and I don't regret it. Because this is what Itachi wanted. Nowhere in his will did it say I should follow my own path, and my own heart, and find my own passion. Nowhere did it say that I should let her color me in with feeling and let art drown music and be fucking happy.

I let her go.

And now, I'm better for it. Because now I can't feel _anything._ Not even pain.

And I'm just like Itachi.

There's your answer.

* * *

It's two weeks later and late at night and I'm tattooing Konan's back when Deidara calls to me from the front of the bus, on the way to the next city.

I won't call my bandmates friends, because I think I might hate them. Not in a strong, in-your-face kind of hate like when they first came to Konoha wanting me to join. Just quieter and subtle and right below the surface of my skin, and I hate them patiently because they took Itachi from me, and I wouldn't be here in this cocaine-filled fucking bus if it wasn't Itachi's dying wish, apparently.

Still, though, I'm beginning to warm up to them. Under all that hate, of course.

Konan's rose is coming out clean as hell. I'm precise with my tattooing even on a moving bus and with a bunch of spectators. The gun and equipment I jacked from Kakashi's serves me as well out on the road as it did back at Ink and Iron. I don't normally do flowers, but if I do anything, I'm gonna do it well.

Whether that be execute a slamming guitar solo, or pull off a badass tattoo, or break every bond I ever made in one fell swoop, I do it with fucking _skill._

"It needs color, kid," Sasori tells me, a familiar argument. Still nagging me about that. At least it's better than Deidara, constantly yelling about the explosiveness of art. I don't want to add color yet. "Some saturation. She wants blue, give it to her. You've got plenty of ink."

"Don't boss him around, Sasori," Konan says dryly, facedown on the futon while I round off another petal in sharp black ink. "You know he doesn't want color. It's an uncomfortable topic."

Konan's one of those annoyingly perceptive type of women. The kind who know too much for having met you so soon. The kind who size you up and figure you out when you haven't even figured yourself out yet. She mostly keeps to herself and focuses on laying down new lyrics for upcoming Akatsuki songs, but whenever she deigns to speak to me, it's always with this needling clarity like she only needed five seconds to learn everything there was to know about me.

"Yo, Sasuke! Phone call!"

Everyone looks up at that; Konan shifts underneath the needle and cranes her head to get a good look at me. No one's ever called for me before, not in six weeks of travel and playing time. I changed my phone number the day I left, nobody back in Konoha knows it, and I haven't given it out to anybody not on this bus with me right now. Everyone is under strict orders not to try to get a hold of me.

Everyone's surprised at this call. I even feel Orochimaru, benignly flicking through his cell phone the way he always does, look at me with this vacant, sort of benign interest.

Irritated, because I'm _almost_ done outlining the rose Konan asked for, I snap off my gloves and mutter, "Don't move," before making my way to the front of the bus. Deidara hands me the bus phone, as interested as anybody else is judging by the way his one visible eye is wide, and I grip it, thinking that if it's Naruto I might go back to Konoha just to kill him.

"What?" I snap into the receiver.

The voice that responds is shaky. Teary. Feminine and strong.

"S-Sasuke? It's…it's me. I need…I need to talk to you."

"…_you._"

Well look at that. I guess I _can_ be surprised after all.

* * *

**note..** hey y'all. :) thank you so much for all the love you give this story. i love writing it.

xoxoxo daisy :)


	19. Arabesque

Six weeks have passed now since I've had to learn what it's like to live without a heart.

Okay, yeah, maybe that's dramatic. But maybe it's not. Maybe it's how I'm feeling.

Anyway.

Six weeks have passed and my life is _completely different._

Konoha Performing Arts Academy is my home, it's not like I have anywhere else to go and I'm too close to the end to drop out now. Tsunade thinks I'm better off staying in the dance program until graduation.

But now, I take lessons with her, and I dropped the ballet program.

When I tell you Miss Suzume flipped her shit, just imagine a volcanic explosion. Like Pompeii, only instead of killing thousands of innocent villages, she lit me up with lava words and tried to bring me down to ashes.

But I guess getting your heart broken and reaching (and surpassing) every single limit you possess reshuffles your priorities. Because while she screamed in my face that I was and am and always will be her biggest disappointment, that I'm an insult to my dead parents and the dancing gods and that I'll end up nowhere with nothing and no one, all I was thinking about was getting a pizza delivered to my room.

"Thank you for the opportunity," I told her with dignity, because she really did her best with me. "I appreciate it." I do. "I'll never forget you." You fucking bitch, watch how big I make it without you. I never forget _anything._

So after Miss Suzume lost her mind and her best student all in one afternoon, I immediately enrolled in the contemporary dance classes with Miss Kurenai. She's a good teacher, really. She is. She's tough but not cruel, and she demands excellence but she's got a really good sense of humor, and she knows when to ease up.

There's so much more _freedom_ in contemporary. I've been branching out to new styles, there's so much wiggle room whereas ballet was so rigid. Robotic. One way to do anything and only one way. But contemporary is _literally_ limitless. It's like flying sometimes. The way dance used to be for me, and is becoming again.

I've had to quit my job at Ink and Iron. Granted, it's not like I ever wanted to take night cleaning professionally, but part of me misses it.

A bigger part of me knows that I couldn't fucking handle being back there without him.

But I'm busier than ever now, only in a good way. I have my contemporary classes with Miss Kurenai, and then I have private lessons with Tsunade at KCA. It's really hush-hush for now, only Ino and Miss Kurenai know where I go every day after school. But since I'm not doing so many ballet competitions anymore, I don't need all the extra money I was making at Kakashi's.

Oh, yeah, and I have a social life now. People don't really look at me as untouchable Sakura Haruno anymore. People don't admire me and keep their distance.

People hang out with me. And say hi to me when we pass in the hallways and invite me to their parties. Naruto – Naruto really misses him – and he and I are closer than ever; now that I'm not killing myself with ballet anymore, Ino and I don't have much to fight about. And it's great, really, it truly is.

I'm not deathly skinny anymore. I feel better. I feel _healthy._ There's color in my face. There's no more crippling anxiety, no more inability to sleep. I'm good. I'm popular. I'm going places, I've got an in at my top school and dance is freedom again and things are going good. Things are going _well._

I'm happy, I think. Close enough, anyway. I'm okay.

Oh yeah and my heart's still missing.

It's okay, though. Because like a fucking dumbass, I had him write his name on me.

At least it helps me remember where it used to be, when it was still mine.

When it didn't belong to him.

* * *

"He's got a show in Ame, Sakura," Naruto says, throwing open my dorm room door without any fanfare, any polite knock. I glare at him from where I'm stretching out my legs – it was a tough day, but a good one – and say nothing in response.

"Sasuke," Naruto clarifies, like I don't already know.

God.

"It's his first big gig with Akatsuki. We gotta go, Sakura! It's tomorrow night. We can still get tickets, I got a friend out there who can get us in, and…"

"I am not going, and neither are you."

My voice is surprisingly cold. I can tell he's taken off guard by the way his eyes widen slightly, like he's stunned to hear me snap like that. But I got my reality check at a rainy bus stop a few weeks ago, and Naruto is long overdue.

"Give it up, Naruto," I tell him, thinking of, and resenting, the countless attempts Naruto's made to track Sasuke down since he left. "He left us. He's got a new thing now. New friends. It's over. Move on. He already did."

"If you really believed that," Naruto says quietly, "why did you let him tattoo you?"

Self-consciously, I adjust my hoodie until I'm sure it covers the big black smoking gun on my chest. Then I get up off the floor where I was doing my stretches and face Naruto squarely, Naruto who makes me kind of jealous with his determination, who is so full of bone-deep confidence that he can simply will Sasuke into coming back home and being his best friend again.

Sweet, kind, unfailingly gentle Naruto, who needs a good adrenaline shot of _awareness._

"Because I made a mistake," I murmur, running my hand fondly through his spiky blonde hair. "And…and I don't want you to make the same mistake. You have to let him go, Naruto."

"He's my best friend!" Naruto argues, predictably, getting angry and jerking away from me. "I can't just…he's _your_ boyfriend!"

"No he's not," I say sharply. That word – that level of commitment – that was never on the table for Sasuke and me. I was a bandaid for him, nothing more. A distraction. Someone he found attractive and replaceable enough to fuck without feeling.

I made the mistake once, of overestimating my value to Sasuke Uchiha. And the result is an eternal reminder on my chest of what happens when you let yourself fall.

I will _never_ make that mistake again, and if I can help Naruto, if I can save him from all this festering, rotting regret, then I will. Maybe that'll count for something. Karma, or whatever.

"He's _gone,_" I tell him. "Just…you're right, it isn't fair. He shouldn't have left. He should've stayed. Whatever he's looking for…he won't find it out there. You were a good friend to him, Naruto. Better than someone like him deserved. And what he did to me, I can move on because it was my fucking fault in the first place.

"But what he did to you – what he's doing to you right now – I will _never_ forgive that."

Because Naruto deserves better than what Sasuke's putting him through. Naruto deserves a best friend that won't bail when life gets hard. Naruto deserves a best friend who's as good and pure and kind as he is, and Sasuke, even at his best, was never that.

Naruto looks sadder and sadder with every word I say. But he needs to hear this. So I keep talking.

"This is your chance to move on now. Things are going really well with your band, aren't they? Now that Sai's filling in for Sasuke? Who knows, maybe a record deal for you guys after we graduate isn't far off! You don't need him to make it. He gave this up, not you; you have nothing to regret. Just…just move on, Naruto."

I tell myself a lot of the same things late at night, practicing in the mirror.

"I don't believe you gave up on him, Sakura. I don't believe you _can._ So if you ever want to talk about this shit honestly, you know where to find me. In the meantime, I'm _going_ to that concert in Ame and I'm gonna talk some sense into that asshole. And he's gonna come back here, to you, because you two are fucking made for each other."

Naruto's eyes are blazing and his voice is genuine and it breaks my heart all over again. I wonder if Sasuke, keeping it with him in his guitar case, hears the sound as it fissures down the middle, or if it's muffled by the leather.

He doesn't know when to quit. And he doesn't know how to lie either, like I do. Which makes everything worse.

He turns on his heel and reaches for the door and when I speak again, it's entirely devoid of that chilling detachment I try so hard for.

"I _can't_ believe that, Naruto," I whisper, bowing my head. He pauses and I feel him turn back around to look at me but I stare at the floor instead, ashamed of my weakness, ashamed of my longing. That Naruto's right – that I haven't moved on – but I need to anyway, because I can't change Sasuke's mind. I tried to, and it didn't work.

It got me nowhere. I can't force him to love me, and he doesn't. That's the end of the story. The end of Sasuke-and-Sakura, a diluted, ineffectual Romeo and Juliet, star-crossed and something like lovers but mostly just _nothing._

The end.

"I know he fucked up," Naruto says quietly, and I feel him wrap his big bear arms around me and pull me in tight. He smells like Chinese food and it makes me think of Sasuke and I want to throw up but I don't, because I had plenty to eat today. "Baby girl I know he hurt you. But he only did it because he doesn't know what the hell he's doing. He looked at you and I swear it was like he was a different person. Maybe he left you but he still hasn't let you go.

"So don't you let him go, Sakura."

* * *

Naruto keeps his word, and he takes a plane out to Ame and he goes with Kiba and Shikamaru.

I stay behind.

And he comes back dejected and disappointed, as I knew he would be:

Sasuke's bodyguards wouldn't let any of them near the bus.

* * *

After that disaster, I avoid Naruto. I feel guilty for my role in this whole mess, and I feel like Naruto thinks he's doing me a favor by trying to get Sasuke to come back to me.

But really, it's infuriating.

It's grating and abrasive and unwanted and ill-timed and poorly-executed.

If Sasuke ever comes back, and I know he won't, I know how much he hates Konoha for what happened with Itachi, but if he does, I'll never trust that he's doing it _for me._ I'll always wonder if he'd do it out of some misplaced sense of responsibility to Naruto, who's been blowing up his phone and tracking him down to different cities and different shows, trying to guilt him into returning for me.

I hate that.

If Sasuke ever hears about me again, I want him to hear this:

That I made it. And I made it without him. And I didn't need him even when he thought I did. And I'm happy and healthy and successful, and I have friends who care about me and someday, when I learn to regrow a heart, a man who will love me unconditionally, and without reservation. Strong. Unbreakable. _Titanium._

_That's_ what I want Sasuke to remember about me.

And I can't have that last laugh if Naruto's out there, begging for scraps on my behalf.

So there's a fissure between us now, between me and Naruto, and it's one more way I can thank Sasuke for fucking up my life. It's like we're divorcing, and he gets to keep Naruto.

So I start to avoid him little by little, even after we got so close, because it hurts to be around him. It's painful thinking that he thinks so little of me, that I'm so dependent on Sasuke that I can't function without him.

"And doesn't he see how good things are now?" I gripe to Ino one day on a run. "Like, I quit ballet, and I _love_ contemporary and yeah he doesn't know about Tsunade or KCA or anything but don't I seem happier? Isn't that enough?"

"He knows you miss him, Sak," Ino tells me, slightly out of breath because of how far we've been running, and how fast. It's warmer lately and there's no more snow and ice, so I like to venture further away from campus on my runs and she's dragged somewhat reluctantly along. "That's all. I know you miss him, too."

"I do not _miss him._ I _despise_ him."

"I believe you think you hate him," Ino says. "But if you'd really moved on, you wouldn't feel anything at all. And you only ever really hate the person you love the most."

"I _have_ to hate him. Don't you hate him? Don't you want to smack him upside his head for leaving us?"

"'Course I do. But I was never in love with the kid, Sakura, I'll never understand what you're going through. And I'm sorry. I wish I could help you out with this, but I think you're in denial."

Denial.

Delusion.

I hate how fucking perceptive she is.

Suddenly cognizant of a stitch in my side, I pull to an abrupt halt and bend over, breathing hard. It's the worst way to get rid of a stitch but part of me, a tiny part, is glad for the concentration of pain into one area of my body. Makes the rest of it easier to deal with for a minute. I'll never cut myself or anything but I totally see why people do it.

Ino stops, too, panting, her blonde bangs soaked and curly with sweat. For a minute we just stand there trying to catch our breaths, somewhere in the park near the river. I wish every place in this town didn't have a memory attached to Sasuke but it does; I remember his practice studio had a great view of this place.

I can't escape from him. He's out of Konoha, yeah, but he _is_ Konoha. Every sidewalk, every building, every dusty corner and empty practice room, he's there. It's all around, it's all the time.

"He's everywhere, Ino," I whisper. "He's…maybe this is why he left. You know? Maybe Itachi was to him what he was to me. Maybe he couldn't get away from Itachi's memory being here."

Ino looks at me with beautiful, sad blue eyes and rubs my shoulder comfortingly.

"I don't think anybody but Sasuke could tell us what's going on in his head," she tells me gently. "Maybe…maybe you should call him."

"No."

The answer is immediate, and absolute.

Maybe I'm handling this break-up (can I call it that?) all wrong, maybe I've got too much animosity built up and maybe I'm bitter and doubtful. Maybe Naruto's right, that I haven't given up hope and maybe Ino's right, that I need to hear Sasuke's reasons from his own mouth.

Maybe I'm wrong all the way around.

But I will _not_ reach out to him. I won't do it. I put my heart on the line for him, and then he stole it. I put myself out there, and he kissed me and walked away. I told him I loved him and he _apologized._

"If you guys are right, and there was more to us than I saw," I tell Ino, with a humorless smirk, "then he can be the one to reach out. But he won't, because there wasn't.

"It was no feeling. It was all surface. There was no grandiose love affair brewing like you want to believe there was. Like I wanted. It was just sex."

Ino pierces me with an unforgiving gaze and says, "Whatever you say."

She doesn't believe me.

Nobody does.

* * *

"_Excellent,_" Tsunade says emphatically, after I've just held a backbend for close to a minute. Praise from her is not handed out freely, and like an asshole, I glow.

It's just the two of us in the practice room, just good wooden floors and a sprawling mirror wall and a barre. She runs me through my warm-ups and tries to improve my flexibility. Getting that rigid ballerina to loosen up is a challenge, but that's something me and her have in common, you know. We like challenges. We need them.

"Try an aerial."

Grinning, I pop up out of the bend and flip. Toes pointed, knees straight, perfect silhouette.

"Damn it, Sakura," she snaps, looking angry; startled, since I know it was perfect, I look up at her questioningly. What did I do wrong?

"You're like a _robot, _still," she says harshly. "It's all technique with you! You're so technical I feel like you're running on a circuitboard!"

Ah, criticism. My old friend, how I missed you. something I'm doing wrong, something I need to work on, something I'm not good enough at...

"Quit feeling sorry for yourself!" she barks, startling me again. Does she have, like, ESP or something?! "I can see it all over your face. You're _thinking_ too much! That girl I saw that day, _that's_ the girl I'm interested in. The one who let the fuck go. That's what people want to see! _That's_ who I want in my company next year!"

"I…I don't know how to let go," I admit, and it's shameful. Six weeks with Tsunade and I'm still not showing her what I can do. Simply because, I don't fucking _know._

Tsunade studies me hard, her amber eyes relentless as she figures me out top to bottom, and then she says "Take a seat."

She sits down next to me. This well-dressed, surprisingly crude (hero) woman with her expensive wrap dress just sits down on the dirty floor and leans her head back against the mirror behind her. Taking her cue, I do the same.

"You're in love, Sakura, aren't you?" she says.

_Is that all anybody cares about?!_

But because I owe to much to her not to tell the whole miserable truth, I decide I can't lie. I'll deny it till I'm blue in the face to everybody else, but here, in the privacy of this KCA practice room and in the company of the woman who's literally forcing me to put myself back together again, I let it out.

"Yeah. I am. I am and I fucking hate it."

Tsunade grins and demands, "And what do you hate about it?"

"_Everything,_" I snarl, fighting to control my emotions. Because she's asking all the right questions of the completely wrong person, and I can't tell her what I really feel. That's wrong. It's wrong to despise love but I fucking _do._

"What in _particular?_ You're getting mad, Sakura. You're getting mad and it's beautiful. So tell me, you poor thing, let me know what you hate!"

"I hate HIM!" I scream, my voice bouncing off the acoustic walls. I grab my loose pink hair and pull so hard it hurts, gnash my teeth together like an animal and lose complete control of myself. "He left me! I gave him _everything,_ goddamn it and he fucking left me! I told him I loved him, I was there for him when he needed me, I did _everything I could_ but as USUAL my best wasn't good enough! Nothing I did or said or begged of him was enough and then he left and now it feels like everything's gray on the edges!"

I stand up in anger and rip my practice sweatshirt over my head and I point to his name on the exposed skin above my tank top. Tsunade sees it and raises her eyebrows and I keep on screaming.

"And everybody thinks they've got me all figured out, don't they? They see this and think poor little Sakura, what a big mistake she made, she's pretending to move on! And they want me to hang onto him, Tsunade! They want me to believe that Sasuke's doing all this just because he's confused, not to hurt me, that he cares about me, that he loves me back and he _doesn't!_ I'm SICK of it! I hate it, I hate him! I wish I'd never _met_ him! I want my fucking heart back and I want him out of my life _forever!_"

Then there's silence and heavy breathing and Tsunade's pleased, satisfied smile; I look at the mirror and see myself that beautiful wild girl again, with her messy hair and her strange, animalistic crouch, with her knees bent and her chest heaving and _that's_ what a dancer should look like, I think. Like a controlled inferno, ready to release at any given moment. Beautiful. A disaster.

I look at my reflection – at the girl who is me, but isn't – and I ask her, in my head, _Where'd you come from? How'd you get here?_

She doesn't answer me, but Tsunade does.

"The next time you step into this room," she says, "and I tell you to let go…I want you to think of that stupid boy who doesn't deserve you."

Easy request, Tsunade.

I think of him every single second of the day.

I run a hand through my hair and try to calm myself down, and then my phone rings from my practice bag.

"Go 'head, answer it," Tsunade says, grinning. "I'd say you've earned a break."

Sighing, figuring it's Ino or maybe Naruto trying to give me another unwanted lead into Sasuke's whereabouts, I cross the room to my bag and fish my phone out of the side pocket. To my surprise, the number on the Caller ID is Kiba, Kiba who hates talking to people on the phone and would much rather text.

I answer, slightly out of breath. "Hey Kiba, what's up?"

"Sakura where are you?" He sounds agitated.

"At…at KCA, actually." Nobody knows why, but I figure it's as good a time as any to tell the truth. "With Tsunade, my dance teacher. Why? Is everything okay?"

"No. Look, I know you don't want to talk about what happened with Uchiha or anything but I think you're the only one I can talk to about this. I just got a call from my sister…looks like Itachi Uchiha's lawyer called her this morning and let her know about the contents of his will."

"His will? How would that affect your sister? Did he leave her anything?"

"Yeah." Kiba groans. "He left her half."

"Half of what?"

"…_everything._"

Itachi Uchiha left half of his fortune to Hana Inuzuka. Stunned, I'm not really sure what I'm supposed to say.

"But…but that's…that's _insane,_ that's got to be in the _millions!_"

"It is. Holy shit, Sakura, I just…I don't even know. But there's more to it. Apparently the lawyer never got a hold of Sasuke, and Sasuke never got his share of the money. There was some other stuff in there, too, instructions or whatever…I don't know if Sasuke ever saw 'em or what but…"

"But you want me to help you find him," I finish, realizing why, exactly, Kiba needs me so badly.

"I gotta figure out what happened between him and Hana, she's a fuckin' mess over this. And…and you know what it's like, being involved with them. I know it's fucked up of me to ask this, but…but yeah. We gotta get ahold of Sasuke somehow.

"And I think you're the only one who can."

And just like that, the Uchiha brothers do what they do best: take the carpet, and rip it right the fuck out from under you.

* * *

**note..** hey guys, thanks for your patience and your support and you guys are amazing.

i was taken aback by how many people assumed the person calling sasuke was a pregnant sakura. hahaha i don't do unplanned pregnancies for those two, you know. they're too practical to bang without protection and i mentioned earlier that sasuke wore condoms. i think the fanfiction consensus is that if two people have sex a lot, they will be pregnant. NOT IN A JINNYSKEANS JAWN hahaha not with those two.

so no, it wasn't sakura calling. i see her as having way too much dignity to risk herself twice in a row; now it'll be on sasuke to make the first move. :)

stick around, babies. i like you.

xoxo daisy :)


	20. Cover-up

Hana sounds like I remember her, minus all the crying in my ear. She was always really strong, really assertive, borderline aggressive but I guess that's just the Inuzuka blood in her that makes her that way. I always thought she was a good fit for my brother; she's the only one, ever, who never took his shit. Me included.

But it's been over a month since Itachi died. I don't know why she's calling me up out of nowhere like this, surely she's got to know I want nothing to do with her or anybody else. I don't even know how she got this number.

"…_you,_" is all I manage, and suddenly I'm very aware of my new bandmates listening in. The bus is silent now except for the occasional jerk of the tires bumping over storm drains and the driver's radio up front and Hana Inuzuka's labored breathing on the other line. Not wanting to be made a spectacle of, but with nowhere else to go for privacy, I mutter quietly into the phone, "What do you want?"

It isn't fair of me to be rude to her, I know that. Not when she's got to be grieving same as me. Maybe not in the same self-destructive way, of course, but I know better than anyone what she meant to Itachi. What Itachi meant to me.

Unfortunately, I'm the _only_ one who knows that.

Which is why I don't want to talk to her.

I feel this…I don't know. _Guilt_ hearing her voice, knowing how important she was to my brother right up until the end. I never tried to seek her out, even at the funeral, to tell her what was going through Itachi's head that night before he…before it happened. I didn't see the point, I guess. Or maybe I was just fucking scared.

I can't explain my rationale to anyone without sounding like a psychopath, so I've learned to just keep it all inside. And I figured I'd die as the secret-keeper to this sick, twisted, hauntingly gorgeous love story of Itachi and Hana, never breathing a word of what I knew to anyone. Never telling anyone the best of my brother.

"Sasuke, oh my God, I finally got you!" she gasps, and when she speaks, I'm reminded of how it used to be when she and Itachi were together. Before he went on the road, back when he was still at KPAA, a struggling artist same as the rest of us.

It used to be fucking good, didn't it? Before all this happened? Back when Kiba and I were close and his big sister was dating my big brother and she used to make us lemonade and take us to see rated-R movies when we were too young to get in on our own. Back before life got too hard to care about.

I need to hang up. I don't want to talk to her. I don't want to hear what she's got to say.

I want to go back to my practiced numbness. There's safety in that. Security in not letting myself feel anything or think about anything or remember.

"You shouldn't have called," I murmur, ignoring the stares I'm getting from my bandmates and from Orochimaru in the back by the windows. "Just…just stop."

Stop whatever you're trying to do. Stop whatever you're calling me for. Lose my number, forget my name, stop reminding me what I know about you. I don't want to remember it.

I don't want to remember _fucking anything._

"Please don't hang up!" she begs me, and against my will, _another_ memory pops up in my head. The memory of another girl, wide-eyed and desperate, begging me to stop, begging me to just _listen_ to her. And I fucked that girl over pretty thoroughly and this time it is _definitely_ guilt that keeps me from hanging up the phone.

"Sasuke I know that…I know with everything that's happening you really don't want to hear from me. I heard you left school and signed with Akatsuki and that's great, that's amazing, I just…there's nobody else I can really, like, check with to verify this, but…"

"_What._"

"…Itachi's lawyer contacted me and…and let me know that he named me a beneficiary in his will."

_Of course he did,_ I think, jaw clenched tight as I realize why Hana's calling me. _He loved you more than anything._

"Sasuke he left me half of _everything._ How…why…I just…I have to know _why._ This has _got_ to be some kind of mistake, right?" She's like panicking on the other end. Panicking the way somebody shouldn't panic after just hearing that, essentially, they've won the lottery. Half of Itachi's fortune is massive.

In the end, he took care of her.

"So…so you talked to his lawyer, right?" she presses me, and I picture her pacing around with her brown eyes full of confusion. "After…it happened?"

Not really, I suddenly reflect, frowning. It wasn't really a thought in my head, finding out what property of Itachi's I was entitled to. I didn't want any part of his money, and the only thing I really needed to know, that he wanted me in Akatsuki, Orochimaru got from the will and communicated to me.

"Yeah," I lie, seeing no reason to point out why I haven't even examined the contents of my own brother's last will and testament.

"Great! You did! That's great. That's…can you just…look, you knew him better than anybody, Sasuke. Can you just tell me why he'd do this for me?"

I hear her voice break on the other line. She's crying again. My grip tightens on the phone.

"It doesn't make any sense and I'm going crazy trying to figure out his reasons. I'm his ex-girlfriend. Before…before that last week, we hadn't seen or heard from each other in _years._ I'm with somebody else now and…Sasuke I just don't know why he'd do something like this. It's too big even for Itachi. It's _millions_ of dollars and…just…please tell me why!"

This, I realize, is the moment when I should come clean about everything.

I should tell Hana that he did it because he loved her up until his dying day. I should tell her that even when he left, even after he banged a thousand other girls and pretended like he didn't care, she was the only one ever on his mind. I should tell her that he was on his way to talk to her, to admit his feelings and confess how he felt and maybe even marry her if he was brave enough, that night that his car slid on the ice.

She deserves to know, doesn't she? That Itachi's last great act was motivated by selfless, merciless, inconvenient love? That he gave her all that money to take care of her?

I think it over for a total of three seconds before I decide that no, she doesn't deserve to know.

And if that makes me an asshole? Think again. Because I ask you what good would come of telling Hana the truth? Itachi's dead. He can't be with her now, or ever. And I know she loved him back, so isn't it crueler? To tell her that they almost had everything they both wanted. They almost had each other and a lifetime of love, but now he's dead and she's settling for someone else with a fortune she can't understand.

It's kinder, I realize. Kinder to continue zealously guarding this secret about my brother and the affair that could have been a love story if Christmas Eve was warmer and no ice had built up on the streets, than it would be to confess and transform a grieving girl into a heartbroken kind of widow.

"Who knows why Itachi did anything," I mutter carelessly. "He was probably on a bender when he wrote the will anyways."

A cold, callous lie. One that will hurt her for now but spare her a bigger heartbreak, and it's about all I can do for my brother, protecting her heart from the truth. If there's one thing I learned from Itachi, it's that sometimes, people deserve more, _better_, than their reality. Sometimes it's better to hurt yourself keeping a secret than it would be to hurt someone else by coming clean.

So a secret it will stay.

"…maybe you're right," she whispers. "Maybe it's just…I don't know. His idea of a joke or something. I thought maybe it meant…no, this makes more sense. Itachi was all surface, wasn't he?"

Not even close, Hana.

"I'm sorry to bother you, Sasuke," she says. "It was driving me crazy not knowing and…well now I guess I know. I talked to Kiba and he really misses you, you know. All your friends do. They're worried about you. I'm shocked you took my call in the first place."

I don't say anything. There's nothing more to say.

I hang up without another word. And I don't field any questions from my curious bandmates, and I ignore Orochimaru's probing glance from his seat at the back. Instead I roll into my bunk and draw the flimsy privacy curtain and hope against hope to sleep this whole nightmare away.

* * *

She follows me in my dreams.

I can't shake her then, the way I can in real life when all I really need to do to kill off her memory for awhile is pick up a guitar. Nothing chases away what gives you real, true passion quite like a hobby you don't care for.

But in my dreams, she's there.

Not quite like a ghost because ghosts should scare you, and all Sakura's ever done is made me feel warm and crazy inside. Like one of those down-feather comforters that block any cold air whatsoever, that's what she is to me.

And it's always 'is' in my dreams, because when I'm not conscious to make the distinction, I don't remember that now, it's 'was.'

I remember weird things about her. Not just the obvious Sakura tropes: ballet, pink hair, delicate.

I remember the way her muscled thigh felt under my hands when I gave her that massage. I remember the way she always blew on each individual spoonful of soup even though there's no way in hell it stayed hot enough long enough to warrant it. I remember how her sheets smelled like orange blossoms and that she used cinnamon mouthwash and took her coffee with cream but no sugar.

Bizarre little facts here and there that remind me of what I left, but are powerful enough to yank me out of sleep, launch me into wakefulness, and let me know a thousand different ways just how badly I fucked up.

But I couldn't fucking _stay_ there. Konoha made Itachi what he was, what he died as, and I can't live in a place like that. It's a breeding ground for monsters.

_She would have come with you,_ a stubborn voice in my head reminds me _constantly._

And she would have. I know it. That day in the freezing rain I knew if I gave the word, she'd've joined me on the Akatsuki bus with absolutely nothing to her name, homeless and poor and wet and without any direction herself. She would have turned her back on her whole life for me.

And in the end, I couldn't let her do it.

_She'll thank me someday,_ I tell myself harshly, turning over in my shitty bus bed and trying to find sleep again. _She'll thank me for not taking her with me. I couldn't have ruined her like that._

Because I know she's strong. And I know she can make it without me. And I know that me leaving might damn well be the best thing that ever fucking happened to her.

* * *

After the call from Hana it's quiet for a few days.

The band's en route to a show in Taki. Mostly it's just us driving around. No one feels much like getting inked by me when the bus is shaking on rough terrain and everyone's got cabin fever being stuck in here, so we're all kind of doing our own thing.

I get shafted with the task of writing a new song.

Now that I've made a few appearances with Akatsuki and the world's watching since me taking Itachi's place is such a high profile thing, Orochimaru's slimy ass thinks that we should start writing new music, and incorporating it with the old shit. Kind of a way of both fading Itachi out, and sneaking me in.

As if anyone – _especially_ me – could forget that Itachi was ever a part of this. Alive, dead, or some creepy, unfathomable middle ground in between, he _is_ Akatsuki. His shit's still strewn about this nasty ass bus, his soul is on display in every single lyric in every single song he had a hand in writing. Every time I go onstage to a crowd of thousands, I don't use my guitar, I use his.

If anything, I'm like a watery, diluted placeholder. A bookmark in the novels of memory for Itachi Uchiha, the better brother, the real rock star, the drug-addicted asshole who died with a mess on his hands that I'm supposed to clean up, only he didn't give me a dustpan big enough to sweep up all his bullshit.

And I fuckin' miss him, man.

Anyway.

Orochimaru wants me to write the new song, and he wants me to debut it at the show in Taki.

I can't stand the asshole but it's not like I can just say no. There's nowhere else for me to go now that I up and left everything that mattered, and Itachi wanted me here for whatever reason, so here I've got to stay. And play by Orochimaru's dumbass rules. And he wants a song, and there's six hours to Taki and I've got nothing better to do.

Song-writing isn't as hard as people say it is. It's like poetry, only half-assed and warbled, shoved into an ugly meter and sung in 4/4 time because that's easiest to write. I skated by in class by jotting down the typical teenage guy song about making it big and being a rebel and breaking all the rules, but something – maybe it's hearing from Hana, and knowing the truth and telling her lies – that makes me want to try a little harder than I did in Raidou's lyrics class.

"How's it comin' over there, un?" Deidara asks, peering at me from over his Blackberry, the light from the screen illuminating his visible eye so it glows like a creepy fucking jack-o-lantern across the bus. "Don't give us any pussy shit to sing."

"Fuck off," I mutter, no fonder of any of my bandmates weeks later than I was when we first met. They're just _there._ Like props in this fake universe I made for myself. Can't do anything about them except tolerate them, and acknowledge that without those props it's just an empty stage.

The words come easily, without much thought. It's not like I had a destination in mind for this song anyway, since, as I've said a million times to nobody but myself, music isn't what I want to do and I don't care about it anymore. What I write is whatever.

I'm not one for poetry but then I fell in love.

Vaguely, I see her face as my hand skims along the notebook page. It starts off hazy like it always does, and the more I write, the clearer she is. Pretty smile and dead eyes, like one of those figures at a wax museum, face and body frozen in this artificial beauty that convinces people with untrained eyes. She's alive in my dreams, hidden in my waking thoughts but here, in this stream-of-consciousness song-writing, here she comes again, clawing her way out of my subconscious until she's dancing on the page.

_Shit,_ I think, scribbling out her name so no one will see this girl I'm writing about is real. _I told myself I'd let her go but I'm trying to bring her with me._

Akatsuki's sound is pretty hardcore rock, and this song's taking the shape of a rock ballad. The kind that alternative station's are gonna play on loop because it's alt enough to appeal to the hipster crowd but pop enough to appeal to everyone else. A really lazy, half-assed kind of bullshit machine but it'll sell records and keep us in this fucking bus, and that's what matters, right, Itachi?

I'm writing about her, it's relentless now. I'm writing about lofty goals and unhappy endings, and bus stop goodbyes and night terrors and meeting the right person at the wrong time. And when I get to the bridge, I'm writing about how she took me to the mountaintop just by being the messy girl she was, and how sometimes when I can't sleep I think about how I could've stayed and she could've made me happy.

_She'll hear this song someday,_ I think wistfully, changing the key. _On the radio. Naruto's gonna make her listen to it. Maybe she'll figure out what she meant to me._

But I won't be singing this song. She'll never hear it from my voice, it'll come from Konan and maybe Sasori will chime in at the bridge and Deidara might pick up a piece of the chorus. And I'll just stand off to the side and pluck Itachi's strings while he pulls mine from beyond the grave, and pretend like those aren't my words meant for Sakura when they are.

When I finish it, when I stab a harsh period at the end of the last stanza, and when I read what I've written, it's my best work, because it's honest. It's about her, like I knew it would be, like anybody knew it would be since I never fooled anyone but her.

"Not bad, Sasuke," says Konan in her lilting voice from over my shoulder. She's reading the new song and singing it under her breath, matching the notes I've scribbled in skillfully and beginning to memorize it. "Really, really quite good. What's it called, huh?"

Like any other decision I've ever made, I don't really think about it. My hand moves to the top of the paper and I write one word in the title line. One word to describe Sakura Haruno and all the ways we fell apart. All the ways I tore us down. One word for Akatsuki's newest song and maybe some backwards, existential apology for the choice I made.

_Ballerina._

* * *

**note..** hey babies :) thanks so much for all the love y'all show this story, you're fab.

couple things: my PM function isn't working. i can read the PMs coming in but whenever i go to respond it says i can't do it, so if you want to talk to me, hit me up on tumblr. but shout-out to redpapaver for doing an absolutely ridiculously badass fanart for once more with feeling, go peep it on deviantart. :)

and: have a good week :)

xoxo dayzee


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